Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Dan Gorodnik, Chair of the City Planning Commission and Director of the Department of City Planning. Welcome to today's review session of the Commission. Today's date is 01/21/2020 We're joined today by Vice Chair Knuckles Commissioners Benjamin Cerullo Dweck Kirmani Mann Marine Osorio and we have Commissioner Rampershad on Zoom. And before we get to today's packed agenda, I'd like to go over some recent news related to City Planning's work starting with Mayor Adams' State of the City address.

During his remarks, announced two new initiatives to help boost housing production and to make our city more affordable for New Yorkers, City of Yes for Families and the Manhattan Plan. The former is a multipronged approach combine zoning changes and city programming to help make New York City more family friendly. On the zoning side, city planning will look to make it easier to build housing alongside schools, playgrounds, grocery stores and libraries and to support accessible transit station close to where families live. This work will be complemented by a variety of housing initiatives from other city agencies to create more family sized affordable homes, help families make a down payment on a home and count rental payments toward credit history. With the Manhattan plan, we're setting the goal of adding 100,000 new homes to the borough over the next decade.

For most of New York City's history, Manhattan has been a place where you could rent an affordable apartment and start your journey. But in recent decades, this possibility has become increasingly out of reach. The Manhattan Plan will reverse that trend and give New Yorkers many more opportunities to live close to the jobs, amenities and other amazing resources that the borough provides. We'll do this by looking at neighborhood plans, corridors and individual sites to build new homes. We'll use all our available tools including new high density residential districts that require mandatory inclusionary housing, building on city owned sites and more.

This plan will be a win across the board, a win for New Yorkers who get to live closer to Manhattan's jobs and amenities, a win for businesses that will benefit from more local job traffic foot traffic and a win for the city as we create the homes we need to tackle our housing crisis. The first proposal that falls under the umbrella of the Manhattan Plan is also the first proposal before the commission today, the Midtown South mixed use plan. Midtown South is one of the most centrally located transit and job rich neighborhoods in New York City going back for generations. It's home to more than 7,000 businesses and 135,000 jobs. But it is no secret that it's also facing its fair share of challenges coming out of the pandemic.

Elevated commercial vacancy rates are leaving buildings underused and outdated zoning rules prevent new homes from being built. It's hard to believe that an area this central with a 1.4% vacancy rate in apartment and a housing crisis that is dire. If someone wanted to build housing here, the city's own rules would not allow it. We must find every opportunity possible to give New Yorkers housing relief and turn the tide on this crisis. That's what the Midtown South mixed use plan will help us to do.

This game changing proposal will create a more vibrant 20 fourseven neighborhood with a mix of commercial, manufacturing and residential uses. It would spur the creation of around 9,700 new homes including up to 2,900 permanently income restricted affordable homes allowing New Yorkers from all incomes to live in some of the most centrally located and highest density parts of Manhattan. This plan will also be the first time that we require affordable housing through mandatory inclusionary housing, MIH in Midtown. And it would be the first plan to take advantage of the changes we put into place through City of Yes, such as the increased flexibility for office conversions and new high density residential zoning districts and new more flexible manufacturing zoning districts. After all the entire point of creating these tools was to put them to use and there's no place to do so than right in Midtown Manhattan.

Still we know Midtown South has a long and important legacy as an economic hub, one that this plan will support by increasing foot traffic day and night, continuing to permit a wide range of non residential uses including light manufacturing, office space and retail and allowing for community facilities such as libraries and schools. It also promotes transit infrastructure and public realm improvements. All these pieces are essential to creating a truly thriving and more dynamic neighborhood. I'd like to thank everyone who participated in our public meetings, stakeholder groups, office hours, survey and more to help bring this plan to fruition. I also want to give a warm shout out to Borough President, Mark Levine and council members, Eric Bottcher and Keith Powers for their absolutely crucial leadership here.

Finally, thanks to everyone at the Department of City Planning who worked tirelessly to craft and advance the Midtown South mixed use plan to the start of public review, especially Eric Botsford, Nabilah Malik who co leads Ezra Moser, Andy Cantu and Asgha Mohdin and the Manhattan office project team of Josh Shimineaux, Rich Wang, Abby Ryder, Trevor Lovett and Audrey Woks. We all look forward to hearing your presentation in a few moments. After Midtown South, we will head up to The Bronx to learn about land use actions related to Bally's Ferry Point. This proposed 2,550,000 square foot entertainment commercial and recreational complex would include a gaming facility, hotel, convention center and more at a site within Ferry Point Park next to the on ramp to the Whitestone Bridge. Among its requested actions is the de mapping of around 19 acres of parkland as well as mapping a new city street.

Bally's Ferry Point is the final of the four gaming applications that needs to go through EULRP prior to submitting a gaming application to the state defined siting process. That process as you all recall requires approval by a six person community advisory committee, which includes representatives from

the mayor, borough president and local council member among others. From there,

we will hear about a proposed mixed use project at 47 Hall Street in Wallabout, Brooklyn. This development would include over 600 new homes of which between one hundred and fifty and one hundred and eighty would be income restricted affordable. The building would also include commercial space, a self storage facility and retail all on a site within walking distance of Brooklyn Navy Yard and Washington Hall Park. Heading back up to the Bronx, the Commission will review a zoning authorization to facilitate a new waterfront public access area as part of a new mixed use development at 14601480 Sheridan Boulevard and Crotona Park East. The development would sit alongside the recently transformed Sheridan Boulevard and the Bronx River and create additional public open space connected to its neighbor of Starlight Park.

Next up, two parking authorizations, one of which is looking to reduce its required parking and the other looking to increase the number of spots on-site. The former 720 West End Avenue on the Upper West Side would like to add 15 spaces to a residential development with over 130 homes. The latter 125 Perry Street in the West Village in Manhattan is a garage converting to a residential building seeks to renew its authorization to eliminate all 168 of its required parking spaces. Okay. Lots to do today. Sarah, let's get started.

Afternoon and welcome to the City Planning Commission review session for Tuesday, 01/21/2025. The time is 01:10PM and a quorum is present. The first item on our agenda is a certification of a zoning map and zoning text amendments in Manhattan Community four and five. Our presenters are Eric Bossard, Asgha Mohedin, Ezra Moser and Andy Cantu.

Welcome.

Is it on now? Yeah. There we go. Okay. Great. Okay. Perfect. Good afternoon, commissioners. I'm Eric Botsford, director of the Manhattan office here at DCP. And I'm joined today by the members of our Manhattan office project team, Nabila Malik, our deputy director, our three co leads for the project, Andy Cantu, Aska Moyadin, and Ezra Moser, and a core member of our project team, Abby Ryder.

We're so excited to be here today to present to you the Midtown South Mixed Use Plan or as we call it MSMX for certification and referral. This plan is the culmination of multiple years of study and analysis, engagement with the local community and stakeholders, as well as collaboration with our partner agencies. The MSMX plan is all about laying the groundwork for dynamic, vibrant neighborhoods where housing can thrive alongside a strong economy together with a high quality public realm. It's about making Midtown South a place where living, working, creating and recreating come together seamlessly. I'll quickly go over our overarching goals for the proposal.

First, we want to foster 20 fourseven mixed use neighborhoods in the area by increasing housing opportunities. The MSMX plan does this by allowing for high density housing where it is generally prohibited today. It also utilizes mandatory inclusionary housing to mandate permanent income restricted housing in both new and converted buildings, eliminates remaining restrictions on conversions to housing consistent with what was done with City Of Yes, and allows important uses that complement housing and serve new residents such as schools and libraries. Now the plan isn't just about housing. Mixed use also includes nonresidential uses.

And this means allowing housing while supporting the mix of businesses that already call this area home. Our plan would alongside new housing continue to allow the wide range of businesses permitted today, which includes light manufacturing, wholesalers and offices. It leverages zoning tools to promote commercial uses such as live work and investigates tools outside of zoning to support key economic sectors. And finally, our third goal is to improve the overall quality of life, enhance street life and establish more inviting public spaces where people can gather, relax and enjoy the neighborhood both day and night. And to achieve this, our plan would implement incentives to improve transit and create new public spaces, put into place new urban design regulations that both reflect existing high density character of Midtown South, but would also lead to vibrant active streetscapes.

And finally, look beyond zoning to tools that can improve the public realm and quality of life. To facilitate all this, the MSMX plan is seeking a zoning map amendment and a zoning text amendment to create a new special Midtown South mixed use district where mandatory inclusionary housing would apply to all new residential development and conversions. We're excited that the proposed zoning map amendment would utilize new zoning districts enabled by the lifting of the 12 FAR cap in Albany and created by the two most recent City of Yes initiatives, zoning for economic opportunity and zoning for housing opportunity. The proposal would map high density mixed use districts pairing brand new M18A and M19A commercial and manufacturing districts with brand new R11 and R12 high density housing districts. This is the first time any of these districts would be mapped in the city.

And we think Midtown South is the perfect place to be leading the way. The text amendment would create the new special district, which would include the urban design regulations, transit, and public realm improvements that I spoke about. And the tax amendment would also map MIH district wide. Taken together, these actions would result in a vibrant 20 fourseven mixed use Midtown South with a projected 9,700 new homes, up to 2,900 of which would be permanently income restricted through MIH. And would also continue to allow the full suite of commercial and light manufacturing uses that already call Midtown South home.

Now I'll give a quick overview of our agenda for today's presentation. We'll introduce the study area, provide some important background context and go over existing conditions, touch on our engagement work and how it's shaped the proposal, and then conclude by covering the proposal itself. So with that, I will hand it off to Asuka to take it from here. Thank you.

Thank you, Eric. All right. So, let's introduce you to the plan area itself, which is highlighted here in yellow in the map. It comprises of four distinct and separate areas that are centrally located in Midtown South, with exceptional access to transit, jobs, and amenities. The common thread that ties all four of these areas together is that they have decades old manufacturing zoning that does not allow housing, despite being surrounded by mixed use neighborhoods that do.

The planner is mostly located within Manhattan Community District 5 with two smaller portions within Community District 4. The area is also represented by council members Eric Bacher and Keith Powers. We have appreciated a close partnership with the council members as well as the borough president Levine from the outset of this planning process and throughout up to today's public review. We also appreciate meeting boards four and five for their feedback and participation in the process. The planned area covers about 42 blocks across four distinct sections of Midtown South, which are outlined on the map to the right.

These areas are generally bordered by 40th Street to the North, 5th Avenue to the East, 23rd Street to the South and 8th Avenue to the West. As we alluded to on the previous slides, these four MSMX plant areas have incredible transit access with multiple subway lines as well as Penn Station and Port Authority Bus Terminal just steps away. And right in center, connecting the four areas are Herald And Greeley Squares, which are providing transit access and open space on the Midtown South doorstep. The Southeast area is partially covered by Madison Square North and Ladies Mile Historic District, which are visible in light purple. LTC still remains still retains purview, including discretionary review over application within these historic districts.

Here's an aerial view of the MSN X Plan area to help orient you even better. Each area is denoted by its ordinal direction. The Northwest area is North of Penn Station and South of Times Square and is generally bounded by 40th Street, 35th Street, Broadway, and 8th Avenue. The Northeast area lies just South of Bryant Park from 35th Street to 39th Street and is mid block between 5th And 6th Avenues. The Southeast area extends south from the Empire State Building towards Madison Square Park and comprises the mid blocks of 23rd Street through 31st Street between 5th And 6th Avenue.

And finally, the Southwest area is just south of MSG and Penn Station, running from 34th Through 31st Street. Over the following slides, we'll give a brief street view level view of these four areas and a more detailed walk through later in the presentation. Here's a photo from the Northwest area. It's characterized by muscular lopsided buildings, a handful of hotels and a lively but heavily congested pedestrian role. We are located from the Northeast area, which is located South Of Bryant Park between 5th And 6th Avenues.

This is an active centrally located area that contains much of the same high density loft architecture as its Northwest, but also begins to blend with the more traditional Midtown commercial core surrounding it. Here's a photo from the Southeast area, which is defined by its central spine of Broadway pictured here. Speer's built character is varied in scale, juxtaposing modern buildings and historic landmarks and is already benefiting from ongoing streetscape and public room improvements as pictured in this photograph. And lastly, here's a photo from the Northwest area. Again, it's generally bounded by Penn Station, 23rd Street to the South, 6th Avenue and 8th Avenue.

FIT is located immediately to its west. Overall, it's a transitional zone that reflects the similarly mixed use portions of Flatiron District and Chelsea that surround it. This photo depicts a portion of the Southwest area that has seen a spate of new residential construction following a 2011 rezoning, which gives this area much more varied character overall. Now that we've given you a brief overview of the study area, we'll delve into its background and some of the economic and policy considerations that underpin this ambitious plan of Midtown South. So looking back at the area history, we know that the area was primarily residential and farmland until the commissioner's plan of 1811, which spurred development in the area we know today as Midtown South.

The type of development we initially saw centered on entertainment and shopping with the area becoming a social nexus for the city. Both sailors and florists then moved to the area to be closer to its hotels, skilled residences, and department stores. With the introduction of Penn Station in 1910, the area transitioned from these shopping and entertainment uses to manufacturing as the station served as a critical logistical hub. They experienced peak manufacturing in the years before World War II, where it was the center of the garment and wholesale sectors, which became the city's largest industries by employment and commercial output. Post work, however, dramatic changes in automation, transportation and overseas production led to a 50% decline in New York City's garment manufacturing businesses.

Now this is when

the city stepped in to try to stabilize and preserve those manufacturing jobs via zoning protections. And again, in 1987, with the establishment of the Special Garment Center District, which aimed to insulate garment manufacturing to our manufacturers from market pressures and competition for lot space. The 2005 Hudson Yards rezoning amended the Special Garment Center District to allow a wider mix of uses. And by 2018, it was apparent that local and global changes to the garment and fashion industries meant that regulations that preferred manufacturing uses were not working as intended, where they were not stabilizing the industry and presented unforeseen difficulties in terms of compliance. The city passed a 2018 tax amendment to remove these preservation requirements for manufacturing and to allow wide range of commercial and manufacturing uses.

As we've discussed over the as we'll discuss over the following slides, this brings us to today, where both longstanding trends and recent events have necessitated a closer look and study of the MSMX plan area and point to the need to allow a full use and mixed uses that span light industrial, commercial and residential in order to stabilize and further enliven our plant area. So let's start with the obvious. The twenty nineteen pandemic changed the way New Yorkers work, commute and shop. The shift has impacted the commercial office market significantly with hybrid work reducing the demand for traditional office spaces. This has directly impacted the MSMX plan area, which now contains a growing stock of underutilized office space.

Meanwhile, even in light of COVID's recent impacts, New York City has seen tremendous job growth over the last two decades, but housing development has not kept up. Most of the new affordable housing that has been built is concentrated in just a handful of neighborhoods. New York City faces a severe housing shortage. Much of this was laid bare throughout the review process for the recently approved City of Yes for Housing opportunity. For example, the vacancy rate for rental apartments is historically low at only 1.4%.

Because housing demand is greater than housing supply, New Yorkers are experiencing extraordinarily high housing costs. And all of these factors provide a strong impetus to study Midtown South and to help reposition it for a resilient future. A key part of that process is to understand the on the ground conditions, which make the area an obvious candidate for expanding the mix of permitted uses. As mentioned earlier, the MSMX Plan area is located in one of the most transit rich parts of the country. 15 subway lines, PATH trains, the Long Island Railroad, NJ Transit, Amtrak and commuter buses at Port Authority are all within easy reach.

Additionally, this area is seeing once in a generation investment in its public realm and transit infrastructure. Some of these are completed and operational, such as the Grand Central Madison. Some are underway such as the ongoing renovations to Penn Station. Some have been recently approved as is the case with the Port Authority Bus Terminal and some are being envisioned as we speak, such as a reimagined and transformed Harrow And Greeley Squares right on the doorstep of Midtown South. This prevents a pivotal opportunity to get the most housing, jobs, and density out of these ongoing investments.

So given this concentration of flagship regional transit infrastructure, it makes sense that this general area is both officially and colloquially referred to as Midtown South. This map shows land uses in Central Manhattan and highlights how the study area outlined in black is part of a southerly extension of the deep red commercial core of Midtown, where red represents exclusively commercial uses. You can see in the southern two study areas that the red becomes slightly more marbled with a mix of noncommercial uses. Over the following four slides, we'll walk you through what these patterns look like on the ground. Here are two images of the Northwest area.

The photo on the left is looking south down 8th Avenue, while the photo on the right shows West 37th Street, which typifies the side street in this area. Here's a view from the Northeast area. There's a strong street wall presence, but the fabric is frequently punctuated by recent hotel developments that set back before rising share. Moving to the Southeast area, we see the East side of 6th Avenue on the left and the intersection of Broadway and 29th Street on the right. This area has a wider variation in scale and commercial uses in the Northern 2 and is marked by a growing hospitality sector.

And here's the Southwest area with 7th Avenue on the left and West 28th Street on the right. In both images, you can see both a mix of scale and uses, including some of the sheer rising hotels. Let's take a moment to zoom back out and better understand why these four areas, despite their central location and similar bill form, have conspicuously little housing. So as a slight note, outdated half century old zoning has prevented the MSMX plan area from evolving into a more mixed use community as compared to its surrounding area. The plan area outlined in black are four islands of manufacturing districts represented in purple that are surrounded by high density commercial and residential zoning districts shown in red and yellow respectively.

Moving into the MSMX plan area itself, we can see that much of this area was zoned M1 six decades ago, meaning it was designated for high density light industrial and commercial uses. There's also a small section of this in the Southwest marked M160, where a 2011 zoning update allowed for limited housing, while still prioritizing commercial and light industrial uses on larger lots. In M1.6 Zones, you'll see uses like warehouses, retail stores, office spaces, entertainment venues, and manufacturing that doesn't create spillover nuisances. However, some uses are restricted such as housing, schools, libraries, museums, and heavy industrial operations. So knowing the current zoning doesn't allow housing in the MSMX area, it's not surprising that there are relatively few homes here compared to nearby neighborhoods.

In fact, there are only about 2,300 homes in the plan area compared to 74,000 homes within a ten minute walk. And that's in one of the city's most transit accessible job dense areas. Most of the homes you do see here are legally non complying and have been legacies under the state's law or predate modern zoning. Other housing has come from zoning variances approved by the Board of Standards and Appeals. If you look at this map, you'll see how clear this difference is.

The dark red lots just outside the MSMX plan area include large amounts of housing, while within the plan area, housing is sparse. This absence of residential life changes the feel of the neighborhood and especially after work hours when there are fewer people on the streets, fewer patrons to the area's businesses and generally fewer eyes on the street. It definitely impacts the area's quality of life. Briefly, here are two examples of the housing that does exist in and around the MSMX plan area. We have the special case of new housing in the

M160 District on the left,

and then a more typical example of residential towers in the zoning district between and surrounding the four Plan Areas. So the absence of housing in these four areas is pronounced, but the dense urban fabric actually positions it well for increased mixed use and residential density. This map shows a range of existing built FAR. Generally, the darker colors are buildings with lower built FARs, and the warm colors are higher built FARs. The densities in the plan area reflect the concentration of pre-nineteen sixty one and loft type buildings that we saw in the street level photographs.

Here's a close-up of the built FAR. The current maximum permitted FAR for the plan area is generally 10. By contrast, you can see a lot of yellow, which is 17.5 FAR or higher, especially in the northern two areas. Here's what this looks like in practice. The plan area's fabrics reflects a variety of eras and typologies.

The overwhelming majority of these buildings predate modern zoning and can be found at very high densities before the advent of FAR. All three buildings here are commercial, and the furthest to the right is hotel. Buildings in the MSMX plan area can even reach up to 40 FAR, but in context that do not stand out dramatically when experienced from the pedestrian perspective. The build density understandably correlates with a concentration of economic activity with thirty year serving as an important regional job hub. Overall, there are 135,000 jobs across 7,650 businesses in the 42 blocks of the Plan Area.

For the most part, the Plan Area experienced job growth over the last decade that outpaced both the New York City and national averages. However, there are and have been strong changes to that job landscape. The job landscape has evolved significantly over time as different sectors have grown and others have declined. All jobs in manufacturing and wholesale sectors have declined by 30%, fashion and manufacturing wholesale jobs even more dramatically, what has risen in their place are strong creative and tech sectors. The city currently has non zoning tools to support fashion manufacturing, and we'll continue to explore additional tools and programs moving forward.

So we've covered the context and history of our study area and the critical plan for Midtown South. As we developed the contours of this plan, a key component was an extended community engagement process. We'd like to briefly walk through what we learned and show how public input has shaped the direction of the MS of X plan. So starting from our kickoff meeting in October 2023 through to our public info session this past October, we've worked hard to connect with as many committee members as possible. Beyond public meetings, we conducted outreach through our website, weekly office hours, an online survey and numerous site visits.

We wanted a full view of mid tenth out needs, challenges and opportunities. So we hosted seven roundtable conversations with a mix of people, including housing advocates, residents, business coalitions, small business owners, real estate experts and social service providers. We also consulted with Community Boards four and five every step of our engagement process. Our work was informed by extensive online engagement tools, including a survey and interactive map, which facilitated further public input, as well as site visits to better understand the local business landscape and how businesses need dovetail with the area's distinctive built form. From all of these conversations, six key community priorities emerged from Midtown South, ranging from the desire for affordable housing to an activated public realm.

These six community priorities became a road map for us and directly shaped our planning approach for MSMX. We were able to take these six priorities and distill them into three planning priorities or principles for creating vibrant mixed use communities, supporting vital community economic activity and enhancing neighborhood character. These priorities combine what we heard during engagement and our research takeaways and form the core of our plan. I'll now hand it over to Ezra to go over our proposal in detail.

All right. Great. Thank you, Oscar. Give me one second. All right. So now, based on this planning approach, we've drafted a proposal that we think goes a long way towards achieving the priorities we just outlined. Again,

here are

the three goals that underpin our proposal and our land use actions. As you noted at the top of the presentation, the two proposed actions are zoning map amendment and the zoning text amendment. The zoning map amendment will rezone all of the M1 districts in the MSMX plan area into paired mixed use commercial manufacturing and residential districts. On top of that, the zoning map amendment would establish a new special Midtown South mixed use district that would have the abbreviation in zoning of MSX. The second action, zoning text amendment, would map mandatory inclusionary housing districts across the entirety of the plan area.

And these would be the first MIH districts to be zoned in Central high density Manhattan. The text amendment would also, establish bespoke special district regulations for the new special district. This would include bulk requirements to enhance and reinforce the plan area's lost character, which we'll illustrate in some of the following slides. We'd also include limited bulk flexibility for challenged sites in order to deliver more affordable housing. Additionally, the special district regulations that include use flexibility that addresses the mixed use character of the neighborhood and would include incentives for public realm improvements.

Press that harder, I guess. Great. So here's what this would look like on a zoning map. We're proposing paired high density mixed use districts with MIH that would utilize the new zoning districts that were created by City of Yes. As Eric said at the outset of the presentation, we are excited to use these districts, to create MIH that will deliver permanently income restricted housing.

So the three, the new zoning districts would come in three pairings: M 19 A Slash R 12, M 18 A Slash R 12, and M 18 A Slash R 11. Each of these districts would become part of the new special Midtown South mixed use district, which allows to shape the building form and incentivize public realm improvements. Over the following slides, we're gonna walk you through each of these paired zoning districts, in a little more detail. We'll show the type of development it facilitates in its surrounding context, And then we'll provide a view from the street to show the pedestrian experience of its bulk. So let's start with the M 19 A Slash R 12 District.

And if it's easier, I'll just call it M 19 A R 12. So this is the first paired district that we'll cover. It would be mapped across the entirety of the Northwest and Northeast areas as well as a portion of the Southwest area that wraps around the future Penn Station expansion. This paired district allows maximum FARs of 15 for commercial manufacturing and community facility and 18 for residential. Apart from FAR, all zoning districts in the special Midtown South mixed use district, so all three pairings will have the same use in bulk regulations, again, apart from FAR.

So we'll detail this in the following slides. But just to underscore, across the entirety of the special district, just the M 19 A R 12 pictured here, we're requiring contextually sensitive street walls and base heights between six and fifteen stories in height.

So let's take a look at

what type of buildings would result from the paired M 19 A R 12 districts. This here is a view of the Northwest area looking northwards from Penn Station towards 42nd Street. The gray buildings here are, existing buildings. Then the yellow buildings are, they depict development that could occur under the rezoning and were studied in our environmental review materials. So you can see, some of the bulky loft buildings in the middle portion of your screen, as well as the towers around Penn Station in the foreground, and then more towers as you move towards the Midtown core towards 42nd Street.

We believe the permitted FARs we're proposing here are in line with the extremely dense urban extremely densely built urban fabric of this area. Okay. And so here's a view that depicts the Northeast, area looking south from Bryant Park. Here's what 18 FAR buildings would look like in the context here. The existing landscape is varied with older loft buildings and newer towers, and those towers mainly in the form of hotel development from the past fifteen years.

So let's shift from a helicopter view, down to the street level in order to better understand how these buildings are experienced from pedestrian's perspective. Here, we're on West 38th Street in the Northeast area, looking westward. You can orient yourself in the key map in the bottom left hand of the screen. So as far as the view goes, new buildings that might result from the proposal are outlined with thicker black lines, such as the kind of rose colored building that's more or less in the center left of the foreground here. The street wall requirements make these new buildings feel part and parcel of its surrounding context, accommodating high density housing while respecting the character of the street.

We're going to use this particular view actually to go through the special district wide bulk regulations over the following slides.

All right. So let's pause

for a second to talk again about these bulk controls. As I just noted, they apply here in the pictured M19AR12 district, but they also apply identically throughout the entirety of the special district. So it's important to talk about them individually and what they achieve. We're requiring a strong street wall presence, but there's also flexibility built into that. We have minimum and maximum base heights of six to 15 stories or 60 to 155 feet, but we're also allowing buildings to flexibly match neighboring buildings as base heights if they're higher.

In terms of street wall regulations, a 100% of the Ground Floor street wall needs to be at or within eight feet of the street line. This encourages active street frontages, and ground floors, which create an inviting pedestrian experience. Above the 1st Floor, 70% of the base would need to be at or within eight feet of the street line. This allows for architectural expression, some degree of facade articulation and flexibility while maintaining a consistent contextual street wall. And as you can see, these rules reinforce

context with strong street walls and just enough flexibility to match their surrounding context.

Area's We'll pivot to the details of our other proposed districts. But again, just keep in mind that these Bulk and Urban Design regulations apply throughout the special district. Okay. So in our second pairing shown here in, purple, we have the second dentist pairing. It's M1, 8A, R12.

So, these districts cover the entirety of the South East area as well as a portion of Southwest area that's South Of Penn Station and just North of FIT. M1 8AR12 still provides for a high density for high density commercial manufacturing uses at 12. So that's commercial and manufacturing and community facilities at 12 FAR, but preferences residential at 18 FAR. We're proposing to map these districts in areas that still have high density, primarily commercial built character. But as is the case of the Southeast area shown here, they have a bit of a marbling of residential buildings.

It's also worth noting that portions of the Southeast area overlap with two historic districts, and any new development within them would be capped at 12 FAR for residential pursuant to state law and would be subject to LPC review. The portion of the Southwest area that we're mapping, M18 AR12, is currently zoned M16D and already has a cluster of 12 FAR residential buildings with contextual form. So we believe that additional density here is appropriate. The M 1 8A R 12 designation here in the Southwest also allows the mapping of MIH to deliver more permanently affordable housing. All right.

So transitioning to what this M1 ADR 12 district looks like in practice. Here's a view of the Southeast area, looking roughly Northwest from Madison Square Park, which you can kinda see partly visible in the foreground. There's a little bit of green in the kind of bottom center of your screen. The M 18 A R 12 allows for very high density developments, but maintains a consistent street wall with its surroundings. Transitioning again to a pedestrian perspective, here's a view of the Southeast area from Broadway looking Southeast.

So it's more or less the opposite of the view that we just had. You can see two of the projected development sites in kind of a gray and gold that are rising above the landmark grand hotel, which is kind of in the front and center of the screen. It's the low rise landmark looking building. So I'd note that the taller of these two projected developments, the one in gold, is actually the largest development site in the plan area. And it still remains consistent with the varied building, heights already found in the area, but is substantially lower than the, kind of ghosted tower that you can see rising above it.

That outlined tower in the background is an existing tower that's located outside of the MSMX plan area. And you can see that the MSMX buildings immediately below it are a fraction of its height. And, again, much more in context with the surrounding area. So lastly, zooming back out, we're mapping m one eight a slash r 11 districts in the or a single district in the remaining portion of the Southwest area that's shown here in light blue. This pairing allows 12 FAR for nonresidential uses and 15 FAR for residential use.

This is these comparatively lower districts lower density districts, sorry reflect that densities tend to taper off as you go south and west towards Chelsea. So here's an aerial view of that M 18 A R 11 district in the Southwest area. Here, we're looking Northeast. You can see this area is adjacent to the comparatively medium scale, fabric of Chelsea, which is kind of in the foreground here. And then additionally, you can see the taller, higher density fabric of Midtown South, in the distance and in the kind of, like, center top of your screen.

So this helps emphasize that the m one eight a r 11 allows for a stepping down with building heights here, if they're visible to everybody in the 200 to 300 foot range, whereas the paired r 12 districts that we went over earlier typically in the 300 to 450 foot range for building height. And then here's a pedestrian perspective on West 26th Street looking east from its intersection with 7th Avenue. So the same bulk and urban design rules apply here, which help maintain a strong street wall. This will prevent undesirable shallow setbacks, which are the norm for many recent hotel developments that pepper the Southwest area and serve to disrupt the pedestrian experience. So in the following slides, we're gonna zoom back out and I'll briefly walk through some other, aspects of the MSMX zoning proposal.

Okay. So the MSMX proposal aims to, complement the new paired zoning district with a variety of additional improvements including, ways to promote active streets. The plan area win will be mapped with tier b streets on narrow streets and tier c streets on wide streets in order to promote active streetscapes and enliven the pedestrian experience. This tiering system was introduced by City of Yes for economic opportunity, and it specify the types of uses that are permitted on the ground floor, where loading berths can be located, lobby sizes, all of which encourage active streetscapes. So, additionally, the special district will contain incentives to improve the public realm.

So this includes floor area exemptions for, public school floor space if a new development elects to include, or provide one on-site. There's also a special permit floor area bonus for the provision of a covered pedestrian space, which will apply throughout the district, and this would allow for an expanded public realm that can be incorporated into a new building's actual footprint while maintaining that strong street wall presence. The covered pedestrian space bonus already exists in other high density zoning districts and has produced numerous high quality public spaces such as the one that you're seeing in this image. Additionally, the special district will encourage improvements to transit infrastructure by extending the existing section 6,650 transit bonus, formerly known as the ZFA bonus, its applicability to all sites that are within 1,500 feet of a station, whereas, today it would be 500 feet. Alright.

So we'll quickly run through some other regulations that we're proposing as part of the special district. The first is for large retail uses. Midtown South is a truly regional shopping district. So we're allowing for retail uses of footprints beyond 10,000 square feet, which both emphasizes and facilitates that role as a prime shopping district. The area has a long history of being a center for flagship retail stretching back to the nineteenth century and still has legacy department stores like Macy's on its doorstep.

Therefore, we feel that larger retail footprints are an appropriate use here and that the older dense building stock would easily support it. For items two and three here, minimum distance between buildings and split lock conditions where a landmark is present, we're allowing for some additional flexibility for sites that are characterized by relatively unique conditions. This will facilitate the maximum amount of housing on development sites while respecting the intent of underlying map densities. And then lastly, we heard during the engagement process from the community, that there is a desire and preference to limit flashing signage, especially on side streets, in order to create a welcoming environment for new housing. So also just as a quick aside, in order to create the new special Midtown South Mixed Use District, minor adjustments are required to some existing special district boundaries.

For the Special Garment Center District, which is in blue on the map here, most of its area becomes, part of the newly established special Midtown South Mixed Use District. The remaining area outlined, with diagonal hatching to the west, of the main portion of the Special Garment Center District, this would, become part of the special Hudson Yards District with no changes to its current regulations except to remove, restrictions that prevent larger buildings from converting to housing. Additionally, there's a half block of the special Midtown District that overlaps their plan area. It's in the, Northwest, plan area kind of visible just under, yeah, where it says Special Midtown District. And that will become part of the newly established special Midtown South Mixed Use District.

Also, we're excited about the fact that the entirety of the special district will be mapped with mandatory inclusionary housing. This will be the first application of MIH in Midtown and the first application within the highest density parts of the city. So the proposal would map options one, two, and three. Option three is formerly known as the deep affordability option, but was made a standalone option as part of, city of Yes for housing opportunity. All three options would apply to both new construction and to residential conversions.

Many existing buildings are suitable candidates for full or partial conversion to residential use, which can support the adaptive reuse of this loft style fabric in light of recent decreases in demand for office space. By applying MIH, the proposal could generate up to 2,900 permanently income restricted units in Midtown South. All right. So we appreciate your patience here. We're almost the end of the presentation.

So lastly, we'll take a moment to go over the environmental review and racial equity report results before concluding with a summary of our proposed actions and our objectives for this ambitious plan. So in terms of environmental review, the MSMX plan is subject to an Environmental Impact Statement, or EIS. A notice of completion of a draft EIS was issued on 01/17/2025. The draft EIS identified no impacts in the 10 categories you can see on the, left hand box. And then the draft EIS identified significant adverse impacts in the categories you can see on the right hand box.

And then in addition, it could not preclude impacts for, hazmat, air quality, and noise. No further significant adverse impacts were identified and mitigation measures are both identified in the draft EIS and will be explored further in the final EIS. Also, as required by local law, the Racial Equity Report, or RER, was completed showing a lowest category of displacement risk for two of the three affected neighborhood tabulation areas, which I'll refer to as NTAs, and then a lower risk category of displacement for the third. The RER uses census and ACS data to assess socio demographic factors and to determine potential displacement risk in Public Use Micro Area 3807, also known as a PUMA, which contains the three NTAs, and overlaps almost perfectly with Community Districts 4 And 5. Two of the NTAs, MidtownMidtown South and then Hudson Yards, have market pressure scores of higher and highest respectively.

And one contributing factor here is that those, to those scores is that these neighborhoods are experiencing a larger degree of rent changes in the rest of the city. Higher market pressure scores mean it's challenging for lower income residents to find housing in their area. And then it also indicates a strong demand for housing. So by allowing for more housing, particularly permanently affordable housing, can help to address some of the market pressures that the neighborhoods around MS and X are experiencing.

All right.

And then, briefly between 2010 and 2020, the area's population surged growing by almost one third. And the area's demographics shifted a little bit as well. The percentage of Asian residents increased by almost 60%, while the black non Hispanic population rose by over 60% and the Hispanic Latino population rose by over 40%. The white non Hispanic population grew by 10%, a more modest increase compared to other demographic groups. Although, it's worth noting that this demographic constitutes the majority of the neighborhood population at 54% of the total population.

The report found that our, three NTAs have a slightly higher percent of renters than Manhattan as a whole, 77% compared to 70%. And that 42% of households are rent burdened and 20% are severely rent burdened. These statistics, were disproportionately more acute for, black and Hispanic households compared to white and Asian households. It's also worth noting that income disparities were even more pronounced along these same demographic lines. Okay.

So in summary, and in closing, DCP is excited to put forward the Midtown South mixed use plan, which will contain two major land use actions. First, we're proposing a zoning map amendment that would change the plan areas M16 and M16D districts to paired high density mixed use districts that would support a dynamic mix of housing, commercial, manufacturing, community facility uses. These pairings would capitalize on the successes of City of Yes to put forward high densities where they're most appropriate, near some of the most well connected transit hubs in the nation. The zoning map amendment would also allow us to map the new special Midtown South mixed use district, again, abbreviated as MSX, across the entire plan area. The second land use action is a zoning text amendment, to create bespoke common sense contextual zoning rules for the new special district that ensure that development retains remains, sorry, sufficiently attuned to its surroundings while maximizing housing production.

The tax amendment would also allow us to designate MIH District's options one, two, and three across the entirety of the plan area. The proposed actions, could result in approximately 10,000 new homes, up to 2,900 of which, would be permanently income restricted, as well as seven eighty of which could be through conversions. To tie things together, the MSMX plan is all about laying the groundwork for vibrant neighborhoods where housing can thrive alongside offices, the creative sector, manufacturing, and a variety of other uses. It's about making Midtown South a place where living, working and creating can come together seamlessly. We want to foster a 20 fourseven mixed use neighborhood in the area by creating or sorry, by increasing housing opportunities while allowing existing and burgeoning economic ecosystems to continue to call the area home.

And then finally, we want to improve the overall quality of life, enhance street activity and establish more inviting public spaces where people can gather, relax and enjoy the neighborhood day or night. We believe that the MSMX plan will deliver on these objectives and help steward a more resilient Midtown South for future generations of New Yorkers. All right. Thank you. And we look forward to answering any questions. We hope you found this informative.

Great. Thank you very much, Ezra. And yes, we did and appreciate your efforts and that of the entire team and Manhattan office for your work to get us to today. Let me I only have three questions and I'm going to go to my colleagues here. The first relates to we have four distinct areas here, all which are zoned for manufacturing uses.

And yet there are some residences that are sprinkled, I think you used the word marbling throughout some of the areas, maybe even the Southeast being the most intense. How did those residences come to be? What is the dynamic that enabled most of those to exist?

Good question. The majority of those actually are, legacy, residential units via the LaFLAW. So LaFLAW buildings, some residential uses predate zoning. And then, there are a number that were through BSA variances. Also, it's less of a marbling, but that concentration in the M 160 was all as a result of the 2011 rezoning that changed that area from I believe M-one Hundred 5 to M-one Hundred 60.

Right. And that's in the Southwest piece of the puzzle, correct? Correct. Okay. And just to put a fine point on that, the only way today if you were interested in doing residential in any of these four areas, there's no as of right opportunity to do so, correct?

That's correct. No as of right way.

And so if you wanted to do, you would have to come in for a zoning map change on a specific site or area.

Yeah. We had one development in the Southwest area that used 74711 because it was located adjacent to a landmark. So it would have to be through some discretionary mechanism. But I do want to point out that for whatever sites that are eligible that are left in the M160, those could develop residential as a right, but just in the M160. In

that one corner. Yeah. Okay. And similarly for an office to residential conversion under the existing rules, also could not do that as a bright scenario, correct? That's correct.

Okay. In a variety of the images that you showed about context and projected or potential development sites, the buildings in the just to take the M1, 9A and R12 combo is just an example here, they seem to fit very well within the existing context. Some might ask the question, well, you're mapping a higher density residential district here for the first time. I think people might expect that the buildings would shoot further into the sky. Can you explain a little bit why the result is buildings that fit into the context in the way that these look like they do?

Yeah. I can take a stab at that, but so can Eric and Andy and Nabil as well. But generally speaking, having a strong base height helps to distribute units lower down. And then also, these are subject to MIH, and there's certain distribution requirements within the building that would limit, for example, like, you know, one unit per floor, some of the things you see outside of the MSMX plan area. But anyone wanna add more color? Yeah.

Thank thank you for the question. And this is a question that we've heard in our engagement efforts as well and speaking to community members and stakeholders. It's a kind of a similar question to what we get about the amount of new construction versus conversions we might see in this area. And as Ezra mentioned, know, MIH is a powerful steering factor, for buildings away from super tall condos toward rental models that are naturally more limited in height. You know, as you see in this image here and as we walk through in the presentation, this is a highly varied area.

You have buildings that regularly go between thirty, sixty stories in height, in some cases even taller than that around the area. Our buildings fit very comfortably in the context of in the 300 to 400 foot range generally. You know, so we feel really quite confident that that's the the the size of buildings that you're likely to get. The size of available development sites in Midtown South is also a powerful steering factor, we'll say. As you can see, our sites do tend to be pretty small.

And the likelihood that sites beyond this would redevelop comes down a lot to the fact that the existing buildings in Midtown South are very, very high density today, generally. We saw in the presentation, you've got many buildings that exceed the 15 or 18 FAR that we're proposing here, buildings that go above 20 FAR, 30 FAR, even up to 40 FAR today. So we feel confident that the projections that we've done as part of the study, both the number of sites that are likely to redevelop and the scale of the buildings that would result are what you would see here in these images as representative of the type of building that would result.

Okay. Last one for me. On the question of existing jobs in these four boxes, I forgot what word we're calling them exactly, quadrants. Quadrants. Quadrants, thank you.

I'm not going to be helping my son on his geometry homework anytime soon, I guess. Jobs are up over the past decade in a variety of categories, but not in manufacturing, I note. But jobs are up. And these are areas, quadrants that are seeing job opportunities and lots of jobs present. My question for you all is, one, what is the distinction between jobs going up and manufacturing jobs going down?

And as that relates to one of these areas, which of course is defined as Garment District? And two, how do you feel that the department has struck the balance between creating an opportunity for housing, while also not doing harm to an existing dynamic where there are plenty of jobs present. So I will pose those two generally to you all.

Thank you for the question.

So that's correct. As you mentioned, and as Aska noted in the presentation, for the most part, the plan area really has seen job growth over the last decade that has outpaced the city overall. But you are correct in also noting that there has been a decline, especially within fashion manufacturing over the decades. So we've seen a 60% decline in fashion manufacturing, but also a 27% decline in fashion wholesale. And where we have seen significant growth is 60% growth in the creative sector for employment over the last decade, as well as 35% growth in the tech sector employment over the last decade.

And, you know, this is part of this is sort of overall industry changes that are affecting the city. But also to your second question, I would say that the way that MSMX is proposed in the zoning districts that we are proposing here, they will continue to allow all existing uses. And coming on the heels of zoning for economic opportunity as well, the added flexibility that citywide initiative provided is also going to provide that same flexibility here for nonresidential uses. What I'll also note is that the manufacturing districts that are being paired here are providing higher density than what is currently allowed. Currently, it's 10 FAR maximum.

And so we're going to get up to 15 FAR for nonresidential uses as well. So that's really where we're trying to strike the balance here based on the densities we're proposing.

Okay. Thank you very much. Let me start with Commissioner Cerullo.

So I'm gonna try to do this in like speed questions so I don't take too much time. But I just wanna commend the team on the presentation. Very exciting project. So just on that point, the selection of the quadrants, or I really should reverse this and say the areas left out that created the quadrants, what was the rationale behind that? So the geography as we see it, not so much what it is, but what it isn't. What created that space?

Okay. Thank you. Yeah. So we were just bringing up the zoning map here for you. So what the four areas share is the m zoning. The m? The m zoning. They are surrounded by a sea of either mixed use commercial, which allows both commercial and residential today, or residential districts. So but but really largely and here you can see it in this image. The red is this, you know, mixed use commercial residential Right. That these are embedded within. So what the four areas share is manufacturing zoning. Again, where housing is generally prohibited, and And this is where we think it really makes sense to address these four areas.

That makes sense. I just wanted to it wasn't clear to me. So I appreciate that. And in the definition of Midtown Business District, I think I saw for a moment that's defined basically as CB4 and five. Is that how you're defining Midtown Business District? Because then there was parentheses that said sort of primarily. What is the definition of Midtown Business District for purposes of this proposal and the data that is related to it?

Asking New Yorkers to define the boundaries of a neighborhood is dangerous territory, commissioner. But you you I think there there are several definitions that we can point to. There's the special Midtown District, which is, you know, a zoning special district that is located primarily in CB 5, but also extends a little bit into 6 and a little

bit of 4. But Okay.

Sorry. Did you want to

I was there's a slide, just so you know what I'm referring I'm not just pulling the the language out. There's a slide toward the end. Maybe three, four, five slides where there was there were data points. Not to take up too much time on this. It was

a chart. Oh, NTAs at the

very end. Yeah. I think you're referring to the racial equity report. Sure.

Yes. And then there was sort of a definition at the at the top where it said Midtown business districts. Apologies for the That's okay. I've been again okay. Yes. And yes. But it was there was a chart where it was at the top, and it was it looked like it was being defined, but

I really wasn't sure if

it was. It's not this chart. There it is. Got it. You see the Puma, Chelsea and Clinton, which I guess we could all kind of understand what that refers to. But then it says and Midtown Business District, and then it says approximately four and five.

Yeah. So, my understanding is is that this is more of a colloquial reference in the, the top line here. And these are the actual official definitions of the NTAs. So Midtown slash Midtown South is one NTA. Okay. Ken Yards, Chelsea Flatiron, Union Square is another, and then we have Clinton slash Hell's Kitchen. So those are the more, official designations, and this was just kind of referring to the areas more broadly. And in that case, I think, you know, we could take Midtown Business District to be, again, the parts of the commercial core that do, you know, overlap with Community Districts 4 And 5.

Yeah.

Okay. I I appreciate that. Two very quick ones. Has there been any analysis and thought about what given the the northern the Northwestern closer to 5th Avenue Quadrant, what impacts height may have on Prime Park? And how has that been assessed?

Yep. So from an environmental review perspective, we analyze shadows of the developments that are gonna be in our reason worst case development scenarios. Development that could happen. Hold on. I'll just go to like

I just know we

have we this we've seen this discussion and concern before in other boroughs and other parts of Manhattan. I just wonder what yeah.

Can I just clarify?

Yeah.

Commissioner Cirula, I just wanna clarify on related to Puma and the RER map you were seeing. Those are not defined by us. They're standard they're sort of standard geographies through Puma. So I just wanna clarify that.

I I appreciate it, man.

Thank you.

Thanks, Nabila. Yeah. So our EIS did study shadows, and it did not find any, shadow impacts, over final Yeah.

That's that that's terrific. And the last question I have last question I have is more general. What we saw in the proposal with respect to public realm was sort of the concept of incentives to improve the public realm. Is there any idea of what that actually means? Is it bonus?

Is it will it be requirements? What is the combination or the specific? And I'm assuming this is also since we saw transit locations that this is also above and below grade public realm improvements. How will that work in this proposal in reality?

Thanks for your question, commissioner. So as Ezra mentioned, we're enabling a new type of POPs in the area that doesn't currently exist, the covered pedestrian space

Mhmm.

Which is a discretionary action by special permit. So if someone wanted to take advantage of it, they'd have to come back to you. Today, there's already the standard pops plaza bonus, the outdoor plaza bonus. We're not we're not taking that away. That's the status quo is remaining the same. And then we're also incentivizing the transit bonus. So today, you know, the the applicability of the transit bonus only, radiates from 500 feet from a transit station, and we're expanding that to 200 feet, which would cover the entire study area. Did that answer your question?

Yeah. I I think so. So the really, it's it's it's a smaller scope than where I my mind may have been going. So, basically, there will be the, we're gonna keep the plaza bonus, but we're creating another option within it, is this covered pedestrian space. And on the transit side, we're expanding the geography, the reach of the transit bonus. Correct. Understood. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you.

And Pritchard, just to elaborate a little bit more on that. The public realm is something and I think as Oscar mentioned in our engagement efforts, one of the top things we heard about in the area, the lack of public space, congestion on streets and sidewalks, the desire for an improved public realm. Zoning can do some of that, and you're seeing that here with POPs and with transit improvements. We're continuing to work with agency partners and that includes through the seed process, working with DOT, other parks, other agency partners, looking for opportunities outside of zoning that can address public realm improvements. And we think Herald And Greeley Square as probably the most significant public space located right at the hinge point between these four quadrants is a really significant opportunity for reimagined and improved public space.

But yeah. I mean, thinking about the quadrants as they exist now to the best of of my knowledge of the quadrants, we're really we're talking about sort of the building infrastructure, the public realm beyond that and even this new option is really inside a building. It doesn't extend out into the public realm into the beyond the building line. And I just wasn't sure if there were going to be opportunities for a developer or an owner to expand into the public realm in a way that we've seen some quite some successes not far from in a stone's throw from at least the Northeastern portion of the quadrants. But it'll be interesting to see what if these options provide the amenities and the benefits that the communities is really hoping to have.

Obviously, the addition of housing is a that's a win win. But in terms of supporting those who will be living there and working there and visiting, do we have is the public realm piece of this, does it do enough? And that's and there are other ways to get to public realm improvements outside of city planning and zoning as we know. But it will be interesting to see what kind of feedback there is on that.

But I appreciate it. Sure.

And I expect we'll be hearing a lot more as this moves through the public review process on this point. But we love the POPS program because it takes the public realm. And instead of moving it out, as as you talked about, it moves the public realm onto private sites. Private developers pay for it. They maintain it. You know? And especially in an area like Midtown South where we have a really significant lack of publicly owned sites to be able to take advantage of for open space or public realm improvements leveraging private sites to be able to provide some of that is really critically important.

Agreed. Agreed.

Thank you. Thanks, Commissioner. Let me go to Commissioner Dweck.

Thank you. On the Southwest Quadrant, I noticed you cut out a part of the block from 31st Street to 30th Street on 7th Avenue. What was the rationale on that?

From oh, from right. So it's the block just to the north of the Southwest quadrant that you're referring to?

Sliver of the block. And I'm wondering why what was the thought?

Right. So there is a small sliver of M District zoning that is not part of the MSMX geography. That is the area that overlaps with the state's general project plan, the Penn Station general project plan, which, as you know is, a state led effort to which overrides zoning to put into place, high density commercial, some residential development. So we developed the boundaries of MSMX to exclude that state area with a separate planning effort.

Thank you. And another question. If an overbuilt building in converts to a residential from office, would that trigger them to come into the new zoning compliance because there'd be a major renovation? Or would they still be able to keep the grandfathered in status? The

the could you just rephrase that, Commissioner? Yeah. You you have buildings that are built to 30 FAR. Mhmm.

If they convert it to from office to residential Yes. Would they be forced to go to an 18 FAR because the renovation itself is a major renovation where the majority of the building is being redone? Or would they be grandfathered into that 30 FAR so that those sites would never change?

Thank you for restating. They do not have to reduce their FAR, for example, in a conversion scenario. They can convert the full density of the existing building. So a 25 FAR building could convert 25 FAR of residential. MIH applies to that conversion floor area. But you don't lose floor area. You would be able to maintain it. So the fifteen eighteen FAR applies to new construction in the area. That's where the limitation would Right.

But my understanding of the way it works is that if it's a major renovation, you are forced back into compliance under the new FAR. In other scenarios, not necessarily this one. I think that's if you're

like if you're 75% or

more demolishing the building, then you would be subject to underlying provisions. But in the event of adaptive reuse conversion type situation, you'd be able to use all 25 or 30 FAR for residential.

And the language will be clear in the text as such?

Yes. Believe that's clear in the text. We'll we're happy to come back to clarify. That would

be about existing text, not the new text. You're talking about the text, sorry to interrupt you. But the tax where you're describing it being clear is the tax that already has been approved. Correct. And so why don't come back with the definitive answer on this one because I think the answer is yes, you can convert the whole thing. But let us just double check that and

The do deal renovation being a 70% or more.

Got it.

So Just worth noting too that for the types of the buildings that could convert fully, that is capped at 1977 and before buildings. And that was part of CHO.

Right. So we we have buildings from nineteen thirties that are

Right.

Those ones can convert fully. And and, theoretically, had it been had residential been permitted, they could have done so today. Sure.

Okay. Thank you so much.

Thank you, commissioner. Commissioner Benjamin?

Hi. Thank you very much for your presentation and all the work that's gone into this. I have a number of questions about different aspects because particularly my first question is about the Garmin Center District. Because we have seen many, many iterations that have arisen and declined before they ever reached certification. And there has always been a significant difference of opinion between the owners of real estate in the Garmin District and those who lease space, whether they're manufacturing, a lot of which has moved to Sunset Park, or whether they're I can't think of the word for it, where they show their stuff.

And people come from all over the world to see what's on offer from each one of the firms, and they benefit from being in this close knit area where buyers can go from location to location and see what's being offered. Over the course of years, those entities have complained that the owners of the real estate have withheld lots of space from them from being used in a complying way in the hopes they would either qualify for the special permit that's available under the government center district to convert space or that we would adopt one of these zoning changes. How have the makers how have we taken care of the makers? I understand when you say that it is the manufacturing will still be as a right and so will the showroom space. But in terms of dollars and cents, if an owner can make it a residential space, which is gonna get $400 a square foot versus a showroom space, which is going to get $40 a square foot.

How are we going to or do we just believe that the showroom and related artisans will just move elsewhere?

So thank you for that question. And it's a really important one. During the engagement effort, met with property owners. We met with operators and owners of garment related establishments, makers in the area. And we heard, I think, a lot about what the way you summarized it, Commissioner, which is that despite the dramatic changes and decline in the amount of manufacturing use that had and to a lesser extent wholesale use, fashion wholesale use that's present in the area today, what is left is a pretty core ecosystem of users that benefit from being close to Manhattan based clients, like Broadway, for example, and benefit from being close to one another in in the Garment District area.

So it has been really top of mind for us about what is the nature of this business, what's the best way to address the challenges that this economic sector faces. I think what has been really plain is that zoning was not the cause of the dramatic changes that have taken place. And zoning has certainly not been the solution to that. It has not stemmed the broad changes to the garment industry. Had preferential zoning in place for many decades, and you still saw significant changes take place in the industry.

So we really don't think zoning is the reason why these changes have taken place and is not the tool for us to turn to. And, but I think what I will say is that there are some significant tools that we can turn to outside of zoning. We've been working very closely with EDC, on the initiatives that they have been undertaking, both within the Garment District, within Manhattan, and across the city to support the fashion industry. And I think that those are really the best tools that really come in and target specific businesses with financial support, attempt to find spaces for these businesses. And so I think that that's what we've been looking to as the best tool going forward here.

But if we're providing fairly significant incentives for conversion or rebuilding to something other than showroom and fashion related, and I know that you didn't find it to be a potential significant impact, and I'm not quite sure how you examine that and what the impacts might be if these buildings all did away with that kind of space. So I'm not sure why that's not a significant impact, but it's not. But we're providing these significant incentives for residential building and conversion, but the industry that we believe has been important. And I understand that manufacturing, even though there's manufacturing left, it is not a big Manhattan sector. And so the manufacturing part of the fashion district has first moved to Downtown Manhattan and then has moved to Brooklyn.

There was a plan by EDC years ago to move the fashion industry to Queens, to Willits Point near Kennedy Airport since a lot of the buyers and others were Asian. But that plan never came to fruition. So I'd be interested, and I know you may not be able to answer it now, to know if one, we still consider the fashion industry important to the future of New York. And if we don't, we don't. And if we do, how are we going to combat the incentive we provided to owners to disincentivize the use by fashion related artisans or fashion related showrooms.

I mean, I sell. My mother was a graduate of FIT. We used to go all around that area, and you would be able to get buttons and fabric of all types. You would be able to get patterns. My mother made patterns.

There were dozens of related industries, not just for the fashion industry, but for the home user. 90% of those are gone except in those buildings that still have fashion industry related people. So I'm not just concerned about the artisans, but also about the industries that they relate to where somebody is making someone I know has a showroom there and does wedding dresses. And they're always going down the street on 37th, etcetera, to get little gigas, so to speak, that go with the wedding industry. So I would like you to address that whole question in a holistic way of what you think is going to happen to those businesses when the owners don't have to have them.

Sure. I'll let Andy jump in because I know that he has an important point to make here. But to answer your question, Commissioner, about is this industry important, yes. I mean, no question. Critically important to the city, the fashion industry.

That goes beyond manufacturing and wholesalers, but it also includes creative other parts of our creative sector as well, some of which are office. Some of the creative office jobs that have grown up in the Garment District and throughout Midtown South are related to fashion uses. And the nature of the fashion industry has changed so substantially that some of those uses that were manufacturing in the past are now taking place in office use. So critically important. And EDC, again, is dedicating the dollars to supporting the fashion industry, including right here in the Financial District at 175 Water Street.

You've got this huge investment in repurposing a 31 story building for fashion, arts, creative uses. So a lot of money going into recognizing the importance of it. Now to speak to your question about what we think might happen in this specific geography with the zoning that we're putting into place, I'm assuming that's what

you wanna talk about. Okay. Yeah. Okay.

So when we were conducting our research for this proposal, we were very cognizant of the concerns around the potential for indirect and direct business displacement. So we actually looked at three similarly situated zoning districts in and around the study area that had been rezoned in the recent past from manufacturing to allow for residential use. And there was a lot of interesting data points, but I guess the primary upshot of that research, showed that both residential units and residential floor area increased at the same time as jobs. So there was no we didn't see any evidence that jobs or sorry, residential use displaced jobs or commercial use. And in fact, in two of the three zoning districts that we study, we also saw an increase in industrial jobs around along the same period.

And a lot of What were those

districts, just out of curiosity?

We looked at the M16D District that is in the Southwest study area. We looked at the C 64 M District. That's just to the west of the Northwest quadrant, which is in the Special Garment Center District. And we also looked at a C 64 A District that's just to the south of the study area in the Ladies Mile Historic District. And so we found that the development that did result as a result of those rezonings, the vast majority of it happened on the softest of soft sites, parking lots, parking garages, taxpayers.

We didn't see evidence of sort of a large scale effort to demolish and replace existing commercial properties.

Were the incentives what was the FAR difference? And was it going from not in the c in the c, there was a residential equivalency. So they could always have residential. In the M 16 A, there's a there's a residential. Is there not? There's a conversion in the M 16 A.

M 16 D?

Yeah. 16 D.

Yeah. So the the

M 16 D was rezoned from M 15. So it was a five FAR district up zoned to 10 for nonresidential uses and 12 with inclusionary housing. So it was a significant up zoning. And the same for the other other zoning districts as well.

Okay. If you could share that study with us so I could look at it because it is a it's been a concern for that industry for years. And I'd like to make sure in my mind that I know how we might affect them and what we are offering.

Stephanie Schlew, Director of Environmental here at City Planning. The socioeconomic analysis performed did look at specific industries, including the garment industry, and the direct business displacement was around seven eighty businesses of direct displacement. Only just over 100 of them were garment manufacturing businesses, of a total of over 7,000 businesses in the study area. So proportionally, it is a very small proportion of the overall businesses in the study area. But as the others mentioned, there are other policy and non zoning strategies that we think will somewhat address the concerns over these direct displacement.

Okay. And EDC will be here to speak about those when this comes back during or somebody who Sure.

We're more than happy to have EDC come when this returns for hearing to talk about their their efforts. You know, and again, they're directing substantial effort and resources into into supporting this industry, you know, throughout the city. Okay.

Thank you for that. I really appreciate all the work. Now my second series of questions is about increasing the transit bonus applicability area. So we're going from essentially 500 feet, which is a little over one full block to three or four full blocks. How do you envision that working?

I mean, right now, many New Yorkers are terrified of the subway and particularly those long tunnels that could be created by this. How do you envision 1,200 square feet if my business is at 1,000 square feet and the subway is three avenues over? How do you envision I'm going to get people there?

Through a tunnel?

Well, just to be clear, the way that zoning for the zoning for accessibility regime works and the increase in that radius, it doesn't mean that there's a physical linkage between the site that is receiving the bonus and the transit station that is seeing the improvements. It just simply means that we're we're casting a wider net to capture more sites that can improve transit stations. So, you know, if if I'm developing a building here utilizing the ZFA bonus, transit station is over here, I don't have to connect them with a tunnel. There's no physical linkage that's required. It just means that you have the opportunity to improve that subway station at a greater distance from your your development site, which means adding elevators to that station,

you know, to increase accessibility is widening platforms. Elevators would require me to own property that the elevator could come down from.

They usually are located in the public sidewalk. And you coordinate with MTA to identify what are the necessary improvements that the MTA thinks

If are I can just jump in and help here for one second. The you don't need to own the site to approve the elevator. If it's on MTA property, it may be eligible to this point. So even if it's 1,500 feet away, no connection, this would say your improvement of the elevator on MTA property may make you eligible for a bonus on your site. I just want to make sure you all are saying the same thing? Yes. Okay. All right.

Yes.

And we think it's I mean really as you saw in the early part of this presentation, there are a huge number of transit stations present both within the Midtown South study area, just outside it, all around it, increasing that radius within which you can improve transit stations and qualify to improve transit stations, we think holds tremendous opportunity for especially when you're talking about introducing up to 10,000 new people or as many as 10,000 new people into this area, being able to get improvements like widen stairways, elevators for ADA accessibility, widen platforms. All those things are, we think, an incredibly positive move to make here.

And my last question is the 10,000 square foot retail that currently is the limitation in MZones. How many of these prospective soft sites do you envision would take I mean, we still have a large retail vacancy. How many sites do you really envision would be able to use more than 10,000 square feet of retail? And I understand when you point to the Ladies Mile and the extension of that, but even the Ladies Mile is looking pretty sad these days with numbers of closures. And so why did you feel that that was a desirable thing to do?

As a first part of response to your question, commissioner, you know, I would say that nothing in the proposal requires retail. Right? And, you know, I I think we all know that retail has changed dramatically, and the department, you know, has tended to move away from kind of like really strict retail requirements to apply, but rather to do things like require active ground floors to limit lobby frontages, for example. And and this plan does that. It's applying the tiered approach to street frontages that was adopted as part of zoning for economic opportunity here.

None of it mandates retail specifically. But we do think it's really important in an area that was long known for being a destination for shopping, the area that has really significant establishments today, Macy's being just outside the study area. Also The

last department store like that in Manhattan

But also, you know, Herald Square, 34th Street, it's experienced a lot of changes and challenges, but has long been a really significant shopping area for the city. We think that simply allowing for that to take place here, not placing artificial restrictions on retail, which

is

struggling already, is really critically important. And you've got building typologies, loft building typologies that support that type of use here. It's very similar to what we did in Soho Noho. When we rezoned Soho Noho, that area is still a very active shopping district. And we believed that going above the 10,000 square foot limitation was appropriate in Soho, Noho.

This commission adopted that. It was modified later by the city council. But we think a similar rationale applies here, that this is an area centrally located, big buildings, long time history as a shopping destination where this is important. And again, about introducing approximately 10,000 new people into the area that being able to have this allowance for large retail is appropriate in this area.

Thank you for addressing my questions. I still am not seeing eye to eye with you about lifting the cap. I don't see that many sites that we're looking at where the 10,000 square feet would not fit the retail that an owner might want to provide. I mean, more and more often these days, particularly residential buildings have significant limitations on the kind of retail that they will rent to even when the rental is there. They don't want any food stores.

They don't want any restaurants. They don't want any kind of activity that will bring other people into the building. So since we're really encouraging residential here, I'm not sure that lifting the cap on retail is really warranted or will be utilized. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner.

Thank you, Commissioner. Vice Chair Knuckles? Thank you.

Eric, in your projection of 9,700 new homes, 10,000, Is that over a decade or two decades? A decade. A decade. So do you envision most of those units being the result of conversion or new construction?

Most of the units are a result of new construction and the buildings that you saw when we did the walk through of the neighborhood. We are for the purposes of environmental review, we are projecting about seven eighty of those would be as a result of conversions. And the rest new construction? The rest new construction, yes.

Okay. And you also indicated up to 2,900 permanently income restricted or affordable, which is approximately 30%. So does that mean you envision option two of MIH being utilized as opposed to the other options?

We are proposing options one, two and three to apply here, And we're simply using the $2,900 as what the upper end of that amount, could be, at the 30% range. But of course, under the other two options, it could be a lower number as well.

It would still be quite a high number. It would be at the low end, $19.40 up to about 2,900. So that would be if everything is deep affordability. It would still be pretty close to 2,000 units.

Okay. My second question is and I don't know if you know this, I'm just looking for an approximate number. Under the M-one Hundred 60, which was rezoned in 2011, as I recall, right?

Yes.

Approximately how many residential units have yielded from that rezoning? Anybody know?

Yes, we

have it on one

of our slides at this one.

It's almost a third of all of the residential units in the entire study area. It's Right. So about 800. Am I doing that right? About 800 units resulted from that rezoning.

And at the same time, we mapped an inclusionary housing area. So there were a couple of 100 affordable units as well.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chairman. Commissioner Mann? Great. Thanks for hanging into this presentation questions. Just a question on the office vacancy. I think the earlier slide threw up about 20% or 19%. Have you guys done a market study of this area to understand what the commercial vacancy looks like? So we're not looking citywide, but really looking at this Midtown area to understand that trend.

So

when we were looking the most recently good available data that we have is about a 19% availability rate for this area of Midtown South. It's hard to sort of tailor the boundaries perfectly to the study area, but in general, this area is about 19%. Okay. And availability means

being leased

on Correct. The market potentially

Right. So the vacancy rate, I'm just curious if you have a sense of what the vacancy rate of the office commercial Just stock

to clarify, availability means it's vacant space that is available to be rented. So it's like not taking a vacancy into account of space that is not on the market, but rather just looking at the space that's on the market but not rented is what we refer to as availability.

Got it. Okay. Thanks for clarifying. And so that that was for this general area. It wasn't for citywide. So I missed the

first So citywide is 19%. And this area, it's hard to it's hard to go that granular with sort of data like that because there's so many different studies that are and sort of sources for that data. And you kind of look at what the average is across that range. We've looked at one of the available sources, which is CoStar. That is a bit more granular and looked at specifically these areas, and it was pretty comparable in terms of the availability rate. But it's not very it's only one source, so we don't tend to just sort of But do yes, it's pretty similar to that.

Understood. Yes, I just think it'd be helpful as I think Commissioner Benjamin's question about sort of the health of the market here for commercial real estate, just understanding a little bit more what the Midtown South market looks like for different kinds of uses, just so we understand kind of what the trade offs are of thinking of residential as opposed to commercial. So I think that'd be helpful as we kind of get into the hearing. Follow-up on Commissioner Cerullo's question about the boundaries. I think it's noticeable, right, that we're rezoning mid blocks at higher densities and avenues, which is not a customary Manhattan phenomenon.

And in some cases, significantly more than the avenue. And I'm not objecting to the densities themselves of the mid blocks, but just kind of understanding the kind of our urban design thinking for this part of town. And it seems to maybe lend itself to the Manhattan plan points that, the chair was making earlier about looking at the corridors as well as an after. But on the C64M just to the West and the M15M just to the South, those are kind of blended commercial manufacturing districts that were left out of this proposal mostly. And so I just wanted to understand a little more kind of how you're thinking about the boundaries for those two areas. Thank you, Commissioner.

To answer the first part of your question about the mid block versus avenue, I mean, it is typical that we map higher densities on avenues and and in some cases, step down on mid blocks. As we walk through in the presentation, though, the the existing built context in this area. You've got very high density buildings on the avenues today. You have high density buildings on the mid blocks today. So one of the things we look at is how districts look on paper as one thing.

But we also look to existing context as well to inform what the appropriate densities are. And we do think that the higher densities on the mid blocks are supported here. Maybe we'll return at some point in the future to look at the avenues here as well for zoning opportunities. But I think as we talked about, the really critical piece that informed our boundaries was where housing is prohibited today. And we really wanted to get in and hit at that particular issue, which is why we're targeting the M districts as our proposal today. And then I think the now I'm forgetting the second part of your question. I'm sorry.

Yeah, just the C64M. The C64M and

the M15M, yes. So just first with the C6 four ms. We are addressing the C6 4 ms as part of MSMX. It's not within the boundaries of rezoning. It's an area that already allows residential today. It has a limitation on residential. In larger in larger buildings, there are restrictions on the ability to convert to residential. But residential is allowed on smaller sites as of right today in the C 64 Ms. And you can see that just to the to the west of that northwest quadrant there, that C64M District. As part of MSMX, we are basically taking what was done through City of Yes for Housing opportunity and continuing that effort.

We're removing those restrictions on conversions to housing in the C 64 M District. So it is part of this proposal. We're not planning to rezone it. It's a it's a text based change rather than the zoning map change.

Understood. And it might be helpful to reflect on the map though. Yeah. Sure.

Sure. And then the C the M 15 M District, that is farther south near Union Square. The reason why that wasn't targeted was that it, you know, it really begins to fall outside of what we begin to think of as Midtown South as a neighborhood. It's much closer in the orbit of Union Square. And so we made the decision to draw the boundaries at a specific point in time. Again, it is an area as an M island that exists in a sea of mixed use that has the same kind of conditions as Midtown South. It might be one that we come back to in the future.

Okay. Yeah. It sounds like that maybe was a public feedback point then because, again, I'm not totally understanding the rationale for keeping out an M zone in Midtown South ish. Again, as you noted earlier, boundaries are sort of somewhat flowable between neighborhoods. So was that because of public feedback that the M15M was not included?

It was not because of public feedback. It was decision on the part of the department to focus on a group of areas that we felt were shared characteristics as part of Midtown South. I

would also just note that the M15M District does permit housing today. There are preservation and conversion requirements. But a new build, you could construct housing today, which is slightly different than most of the MSMX plant area.

Right. No, I want to quibble, but the M160 allows residential, so does the C64M. So, these distinctions are not that Sure.

Yeah. The M160 was just sort of tied to the area adjacent, which is M16, which didn't permit any housing. But yes.

Yeah. So I think those areas seem like they're, I guess, potential study opportunities then. Just one other question on the public realm, again, to piggyback on Commissioner Cerullo's point here. It's exciting to hear that Herald and Greeley Square are focused, given that they're the center of this neighborhood and one of the centers in New York City. So I hope that city DOT can come to our public hearing and talk about their thinking there.

And I hope the administration, which has made a big effort around public realm as a policy statement, but we haven't necessarily seen it play out on the ground. Hopefully, come forward with something there meaningful on Harold and Greeley because it seems like it's a huge missed opportunity not to do something permanent there. So I'm encouraged that you guys are are working with them on that. And then final question here just on on Amtrak coordination. Have you all spoken with the Gateway team to just confirm that as they think about the Penn expansion project, there's nothing here that impedes their thinking?

Yeah. We've had close coordination with Amtrak and have spoken to them about the Midtown South plan. They in turn have spoken to us about patent expansion. So we're in sync on this. Yes. Okay.

Great. Thank you. Thanks.

Thanks, Commissioner. Commissioner Sarrio? Thank you, Chair. Thanks so much for the presentation and for the materials. I found them extremely clear. Everything was very thorough. I found everything exactly where I was looking for. Thank you so much for that. It made it very useful, very easy to read. I have a couple of questions.

The first, I mean, I'm going to leave some questions for later because they're related with the energy and efficiency and sustainability standards. I wanna focus on the DEIS for now. And so going back to commissioner Benjamin's questions, in terms of neighborhood character and also, thank you for your response and clarifying that all you can do at this point is really sort of like stick to what the Seeker 2021 manual requires. But given the magnitude and the potential implications of what can happen here, I wanna engage in in maybe like a little more of a substantive conversation in terms of how can we anticipate what could potentially happen. Not what we know we can say it's a significant adverse impact, but what you very clearly documented are potential indirect impacts on open space and displacement.

And so in terms of displacement, according to the Neighborhood Character chapter, it's correct me if I'm wrong, there could be potentially direct displacement of ninety one residents in fifty four fifty four dwelling units. So I would love to understand a little bit. And I also understood that there's a long time between now and the final EIS where the mitigation strategies will be fully fleshed out. But I was I'm really hoping that this is we can turn this into an opportunity for comprehensively addressing those potentially displacements. I mean, given the fact that this is primarily about guaranteeing access to affordable housing, I think that should be sort of like upfront.

The twin sister of this has to do with the estimated 5,304 employees and in July firms that could potentially be displaced again. So I understand your response in terms of what EDC is already doing in terms of those companies that happen to be industrial and the 114 companies that are garment. But I think we need to sort of like directly address that as part of the rezoning. I don't think that in this particular case and given the history of the neighborhood we should rely on other agencies. So I'm wondering if this is also an opportunity given where we are in the process to think creatively about how this connects with the citywide industrial retention plan, whether there could be specific mitigation strategies that are incorporated into the rezoning to address the needs of these companies, not to protect the minimum amount of manufacturing, but to actually grow these industries.

And so there's a lot in there. I hope you see that I'm acknowledging exactly all of the responses because they've been really clear in terms of what you're supposed to do. But I'm really hoping that we can elevate the conversation and really be proactive in terms of comprehensive planning here.

Yeah. I'll just add one thing, and thank you, Commissioner, for keeping track of all of our responses, that the department is investigating what types of businesses would be able and likely to relocate within the study area, and providing resources and zoning tools to ensure that they can retain as many businesses or give them opportunities to upgrade their space and be in a safer, nicer, larger, more up to Class A kind of location. Making sure that we're not introducing any zoning impediments to do so.

Thank you. I look forward to that. If you can share a little bit more about how they break down into industries, but also to Commissioner Benjamin's point, correct me if I'm wrong, but I really appreciate sort of like the question about not leaving it up to themselves to be able to relocate. But what are we creating? What support are we creating to help them do that as a priority?

I mean, needless to say that the amount of speculation that this rezoning may create could actually be detrimental to keeping these New Yorkers in employed. The other question that I had was about potential impacts on significant in this case a person indirect impacts on open space. And so I know that you've already alluded to the fact that you're going to be working on some of these. But I also feel that also as part of your response given the amount of public land here etcetera or public assets here, is there an opportunity to make a stronger commitment upfront in terms of, okay, here's how much open space can be created. It's clear that the rezoning is not expected to reduce open space, but given the amount of people that will be expected, I think that we need to anticipate that.

So I don't know if there's anything that you may already share be able to share with us. Otherwise, I'll wait patiently. But but I'm just wondering if there's anything you can highlight in that regard.

At this time, the DEIS identifies the standard strategies of improving existing spaces and finding opportunities. As the team mentioned, we're also introducing the special permit for the covered pedestrian space, which would allow folks to utilize on-site space to create publicly accessible open space. So we think that would offset some of the demand. But we're working with our capital planning team and others to identify some other capital strategies for improvements.

Thank you. I would appreciate that and specifically highlight what the city in addition to sort of like incentivizing the private creation of open spaces, what is the city? What can the city sort of like commit to in terms of anticipating that demand? And then just finally, just a clarification question in terms of hazardous substances, it's clear, I think thank you because it's this is one of those parts where I really thought you were really clear in terms of explaining the findings of the study of the environmental study and also highlighting the constraints in terms of how much you can do about it. But because you've already identified that there's going to be the need to mitigate potential residential exposure to soil vapor intrusion, But it's still going to be so hard to really regulate that because this is going to be as of right development.

So I'm wondering if there's an opportunity to create some type of neighborhood wide approach to anticipating or addressing that other than sort of like relying on a building by building assessment that will complicate things and again will be sort of like as of right development anyways. So how can we anticipate that?

Juan, can I amend this

and just say maybe a little e?

So, exactly. So, for all of the projected and potential sites, the zoning action would establish an e designation in the zoning. So, that would require new development to be flagged at DOB and to remediate with the Office of Environmental Remediation to satisfy the e designation. The reason that we're not as you see here, the language is not able to preclude the potential for hazardous materials is basically because of the conversion element of the proposal, because we aren't site specifically identifying these are the 10 or the 20 sites that are likely to convert. Those are the ones where we aren't able to map an e designation because of the non site specificity.

And so, the potential for impact is limited to those conversion universe of sites. So, I think the point is well taken that it would behoove the city to come up with a mechanism, but I just wanted to note that it's

a limited universe. And the e designation, as Commissioner Benjamin noted, will be the tool. No. Thank you. I also appreciate that. And it's just that in

this case, defaulting to the e designation, again, reduces this to a building by building case. And so I'm wondering if there's an opportunity to anticipate as much as possible and address this on a neighborhood wide approach. But I understand your response in that. It's just

that can't do it at this point.

Right. And thank you for the recommendation. We will speak with partners with DEP. I think because the neighborhood unlike a lot of our neighborhood studies, this area is predominantly built up. There has been soil disturbance, there are existing buildings. And so doing something more broad, I think, would be would be challenging in this environment just because there are existing foundations, a

lot of structures, and and a lot of infrastructure beneath the ground. And would you consider some type of sort of

like pilot or demonstration project, maybe like along the lines of the industrial retention strategies or maybe in terms of kind of like how to address some of these new challenges that may sort of like push the boundaries a little bit of, you know, what we need what we can, but also what we can expect but need to mitigate. Mhmm.

Yes. Thank you for the recommendations.

Okay. Thanks.

Great. Thank you very much, Commissioner. Any other questions? Okay. Seeing none, thank you again to the MSMX team for all of your efforts to date. We appreciate your attention here today and we'll look forward to picking this back up with you down the line. But for now, this item is certified. Thank you. Sarah, let's move on to the next item.

The second item on our agenda is a certification of a zoning map amendment, a city map amendment, and a disposition of city owned property in the Bronx, Community District 10. Our presenter is Steven Johnson.

Hello, Steven. Hello.

Alright. This is an application by Bally's New York Operating Company LLC for a city map amendment, a zoning map amendment, and a disposition of city owned property, facilitate the development of a gaming facility and associated uses located in Ferry Point Park in The Bronx. The City Parks Department is a co applicant on the project as they are on all map change actions related to Parkland and the Department of Citywide Administrative Services is also a co applicant on the project related to the disposition action. In this presentation, when I refer to the applicant, I'll be referring to Valley's. So the project site is located in Ferry Point Park, Bronx Community Board 10.

The proposed gaming facility is within a portion of Bally's Golf Course, which is a public two twenty two acre golf course, which is licensed to Bally's. The proposed gaming facility would be in a 15.7 acre area of the golf course that currently consists of the existing clubhouse and surface parking. There are three proposed land use actions. The first is a city map amendment to demap the 15.7 acre area of parkland corresponding to the gaming facility and to map the City Street under the jurisdiction of the City Department of Transportation in an area referred to as Ring Road, which is currently within Ferry Point Park and under the jurisdiction of Parks Department. The applicant is proposing to widen and make improvements to this existing Ring Road to DOT standards.

The Ring Road is the only vehicular access connection into the existing and proposed development and directly connects to the southbound and northbound Hutchinson River Parkway service roads. The second action is a zoning map amendment to map a portion of the development site related to the gaming facility, the CA4 zoning district, which permits the gaming use. The third action is the disposition of non residential city owned property to facilitate the transfer of a nonexclusive access easement over a Parks Department waterfront access road so the applicant can then access that road into the proposed development. These actions in conjunction with the recently adopted text amendment would allow the state to consider a Bally's gaming application for a gaming license. If the applicant is not awarded one of the three gaming licenses, they would not pursue and the development site would remain as Parkland.

So, this is the agenda of the presentation. We have about 44 slides. Moving quickly through these slides that you guys have seen many times. The gaming facility tax amendment was adopted in April 2024 and permitted the gaming use in certain commercial manufacturing districts for the first time. And the tax amendment does not allow any future casinos or gaming facilities, only these related to these three licenses.

And approval by the Gaming Commission via the Gaming Facility Location Board shall be deemed to have satisfied all applicable regulations of the zoning resolution. Now the Gaming Commission created the Gaming Board to oversee the process to review these three remaining gaming licenses for the downstate area. They established a new siting and review process, which includes the six member Community Advisory Committee, or CAC, that will review and vote on each gaming facility application based on the site's location. Now each CAC is subject to the open meetings law. They must hold public hearings, issue a finding, support, and have a two thirds vote approval by the six members to advance the application.

This map shows the nine gaming facilities in New York City. There's also one on Long Island and one in Westchester. The four highlighted projects represent the projects that have additional actions that are not covered by the text amendment. The Bally's application is the final one of the four. The state's schedule has applications being submitted to the state by July 27, which also starts the CAC review process.

And all applications submitted to the Board must have local zoning approvals in place when the Board receives them in September. So, moving on to the area overview. Doverie Point Park was initially 171 acre parcel that came under jurisdiction of the Parks Department in 1937 in order to build the Bronx Whitestone Bridge, which opened two years later. The park is built on either side of the Whitestone Bridge and the toll booths. The park was expanded to its current four thirteen acre area in the 40s.

The eastern portion, as you can see on the photo on the right, the eastern portion of this park was operated by the Department with sanitation as a solid waste landfill from 1952 until it closed in 1970. The Sitting Planning Commission approved the major concession for a golf complex in 1999, and the public two twenty acre 18 hole golf course opened in 2015. In December 2022, New York City Ferry Service began to this area with the opening of a new landing at Ferry Point Park on the Soundview route. Here's the Department of Finance tax map. It shows the casino and hotel development site in the dashed red line.

Now, the dashed blue line represents the Ring Road area, which is under the jurisdiction of parks and is proposed to be a mapped city street. The project area is in the black dotted line, and that includes the area to be rezoned as a CA-four district, which is in the solid black line. We have our area map here. It shows the proposed development site within the park. There's an R-thirty 2 and an R-forty 1 residential district to the east of the park, which moves into the Throgs Neck neighborhood, and there's a manufacturing district to the North.

Castle Hill and Soundview are to the east across Westchester Creek. The park is located in close proximity to major highways like the Hutch, the Cross Bronx and Brockner Expressways. The park is served by the BXM9, the BX5, the Q50 and the Q44 SBS bus lines which have stops located north of the project area. The closest subway station is the number six train, Middletown Road stop, which is over two miles to the north. Bally's operates a shuttle bus between this stop and the golf course.

And as I mentioned earlier, there is ferry service on the Southwest tip of the park. So before we go through the existing condition photos, I want to show this illustration of the proposed development for context. The development is shaped similar to a boomerang. You can see the proposed new golf house towards the top of the map. It would be located outside of the disposition area.

Existing clubhouse is where the proposed casino and hotel is located. The new clubhouse will be designed with Parks Department and subject to PDC review. You can see in the corner, which is pointing to the Ring Road, That's the corner of the road coming out from underneath the Whitestone, and that road leads into the circular drop off area entrance to the casino and hotel. There is a north garage and south garage. There's also a public waterfront park that includes a small parking area.

To get to the waterfront park, public uses the waterfront access road, which is related to the easement disposition action that the applicant is seeking. This is an illustration of the proposed main entrance with a circular drop off area to the casino and hotel. And now, we'll be moving on to the existing condition photos, starting from the very north of the site. This is the road for which cars have to use in order to drive into the course to the golf course, the existing golf course, and the proposed development. Here we are looking south at the corner of Schlei Avenue and Ring Road with the Whitestone Bridge in the background.

You can see it on the left hand corner. Schlei Avenue is the northern boundary for the mapping action. This is where Ferry Point Park begins and where Ring Road is under Park's jurisdiction. Ring Road is a one lane, one directional roadway. So, continuing south, you can see Ferry Point Park ball fields on the right and the bridge administrative building with parking on the left.

The toll booths and security areas for the bridge are on the other side of that building. So, we're just continuing south here. This is the image for parking for Ferry Point Park. And the park, again, is on the right. And now, this photo is where Ring Road starts to loop and go underneath the Whitestone Bridge. Those are ramps that are going up into the bridge. The golf course and clubhouse are on the other side of this bridge ramp, which is right here. So these two images are after you come out of the other side of the bridge and start to turn north on Ring Road. The two photos are basically looking at each other. The top image looking north is the entrance into the golf clubhouse and service parking.

On the left, you can see that the MTA has an area that they use for vehicles, maintenance, and for a salt dome. The second image is in the opposite direction looking south, and you can see the clubhouse on the left and the MTA area on the right. So now we are continuing up north on Ring Road. There's an on ramp to the Hutchinson, northbound Hutchinson River Parkway. The golf course is on the right.

This is approximately where the Parks Department jurisdiction over Ring Road ends, and it already is a city street, map city street. And then this photo is about a half mile north of the previous on ramp that I was showing. This is where the Hutch Service Road connects to Lafayette Bridge. You can see the overpass there, which is the first opportunity to cross over the hutch. And this kind of completes the loop of Ring Road.

And now moving on to the development site area. These two images are on the southern end of the development site, and shows Parks Department Waterfront Access Road in image two on the right, which leads to a small parking area, which is on the left in the photo. And that people go there to go to the waterfront. There's pathways and access to the waterfront there. So these are photos of the parking area for the golf course and the clubhouse is in photo number two.

These are just more views of the development site. That's the ramp going up to Whitestone Bridge in photo number two. And then the final images are of the golf course looking east. The Throgs Neck neighborhood is just beyond the golf course moving eastward. So moving on to the project description.

We're starting with an illustration of the proposed gaming facility and related uses at night looking north from the water with the Bronx Whitestone on the left. The development site in total is approximately 2,550,000 square feet with 390,000 square foot casino with 5,100 gaming positions approximately 170,000 square feet of food, beverage and retail 62,000 square foot multipurpose event center and entertainment venue with 2,000 seats almost a zero five million square foot hotel with 23 stories and 500 keys. And of course, there's 4,660 parking spaces, including 1,500 about 1,500 in the South Garage 2,800 in the North Garage. So the main casino and gaming area on this illustration is in the lower levels of the larger wing of the development. The hotel is mainly in the blue color, and you can see that the space is predominantly dominated by the parking.

So, we have a close-up of the northern section of the proposed gaming facility here. Again, the golf clubhouse is at the top and is outside of the disposition area. And it'll have a separate entrance into the golf area for people just wanting to go play golf. There are proposed to be solar panels on the roof. And you can see the event center, which is a three story event center above the casino and seven level parking structure.

The proposed gaming facility's Ground Floor casino includes a mezzanine, and there's areas overlooking the eighteenth hole there. And you can see views of the waterfront and the river. So this is the southern end of the proposed facility. You can see the widened waterfront access road with a new bike path leading to the small parking area in the waterfront. The parking is marked there as the waterfront parking, and then the access between the Whitestone Bridge and the proposed development.

So this is the existing condition view from the Bronx Whitestone Bridge. You can see the clubhouse with the surface parking around there with some cars. And here it is with the proposed development from a similar angle. And here it is with the building heights on top of that. So, the building heights are measured from above mean sea level.

By way of reference, the casino entry level is 35 feet above mean sea level. And the height of the top of the bridge of the Whitestone Bridge is three seventy seven feet above mean sea level. The gaming facility's 23 story hotel topped with a rooftop restaurant and VIP suites will rise to approximately two eighty feet, and then it'll start to tear down. And then the massing will step downward towards the water, the perimeter of the park, and slope into the golf course. In connection with the development of the proposed gaming facility, Valleys will make improvements to Ferry Point Park, which may include the reconstruction of the existing soccer fields, cricket fields, a new playground, enhanced park lighting, landscaping, improvements to existing trails and new pathway connections.

These improvements will be determined in consultation with the community board, local elected officials and parks department. The applicant is also proposing transportation improvements, including the ones I mentioned earlier related to the widening of Ring Road as well as new MTA bus stops, upgrades to the ferry shell service and new pet and bike lanes. The proposed gaming facility is planned to be a Gold LEED certified building and incorporate design choices addressing resiliency, including but not limited to the installation of solar panels, green roofs and green walls. The applicant is also proposing that a building will meet the standards and other lead categories, including transportation, waste and energy efficiency and waste management. And finally, for their improvements, the applicant will build the new golf clubhouse, approximately 16,500 square feet, including banquet space, locker rooms, a golf pro shop, and their own parking spaces.

So now just moving on to the actions. So the first is the city map amendment, which has two parts. The first is to demap the 15.7 acre area of parkland corresponding to the proposed gaming facility and allow its disposition to a private party. And the second is to map a city street under the jurisdiction of the Department of Transportation. Ring Road is currently mapped as a park within Ferry Point Park and under the jurisdiction of parks.

The applicant is proposing to widen and make improvements to the existing road, which includes vehicular and pedestrian improvements. The zoning map amendment, the applicant is seeking this amendment to map a CA-four commercial district on a portion of the development site. The CA-four permits commercial uses with a maximum FAR of five with no residential uses. The applicant has stated they will not exceed the five FAR. The applicant is also seeking a state alienation legislation authorizing use of the approximately 15.7 acre disposition parcel for a non park use.

Alienation legislation is also sought for the waterfront roadway, which is approximately a 1.46 acre parcel that will remain under Park's jurisdiction. And of course, the applicant is also seeking a gaming license to permit. The gaming facility, if Bally's is not awarded the gaming license, the alteration maps would not be filed. And the development site would remain map parkland with the clubhouse and surface parking remaining. So here we have the current zoning map on the left and the proposed on the right with the CA-four outlined in the dotted black line.

And the final action, the disposition of non residential city owned property to a portion of Lot 1, Block 5622 for approximately 43,000 square foot nonexclusive access easement over the waterfront access roadway. The roadway in this illustration is in green. And the action is so the applicant can have access to their loading areas and the parking garage, etcetera. The public, of course, would still have access to the waterfront. So, on to the RER, the applicant is required to complete a racial equity report, because there is a proposed increase in nonresidential floor area of at least 200,000 square feet and due to the acquisition or disposition of land to facilitate a nonresidential project.

The applicant is not proposing any residential development. And in 2020, the census indicates that in the Co Op City, Pelham Bay, Schroylerville area, 39% of the population was Hispanic, 29% identified as black non Hispanic, 25% identified as white non Hispanic, and 4% identified as Asian non Hispanic. So from 2010 to 2020, the area's total population in this area of Co op city, Pelham Bay, increased by 8%, which comprised of an increase in the Asian population by 65%, an increase in the HispanicLatino population by 26%, an increase in the black non Hispanic population by 14% and a decrease in the white non Hispanic population by 23%. So the profile of anticipated new jobs for non residential space with a known tenant includes the entertainment and game and gambling and hotel industries with 2,175 jobs. The total anticipated permanent jobs is 3,500.

Moving on to the environmental slide here. An EIS was conducted with the Mayor's Office of Environmental Coordination as the lead agency. Scoping mean was held in June 2024. And a notice of completion for the DEIS was issued in January. The DEIS identifies significant adverse impacts related to shadows, transportation, noise and construction.

Mitigation measures are identified in the DEIS and will be further explored between the DEIS and FEIS. The applicant is seeking the proposed actions in order to pursue the gaming license with the state in the 2025. And again, if Balli's is not awarded a gaming license, the alteration maps would not be filed and the development would remain as mapped Parkland. And that concludes my presentation.

Great. Thank you very much, Stephen. Just a couple of questions from me. So on really the first and the third actions, I think I understand action number two, mapping C84. On the first one, it is a proposal to demap 15.7 acres of Parkland, which corresponds to the footprint of the gaming facility, correct?

But there are also some proposed improvements to Perry Point Park, some transportation improvements, resiliency measures, new golf clubhouse, etcetera. Does it is there any do any of those components end up compensating for the loss of that 15.7 acres of Parkland? Or are those just separate considerations here?

Some of them would be related to the loss of Parkland. I think for this project as compared to a couple of the other projects, some of those details have not been worked out as much. So, they're still in negotiations. And as I mentioned, there's still discussions with the community board and local politicians as to what those improvements would be. But obviously, the city will get as much out of the value as we deserve, and those would go towards improvements that will be directed into that area or other areas for the parks department.

Okay. Okay. And on the demapping of Ring Road from a Park Road to a street, is that part of the 15.7 acres? That's a separate amount of the 15.7 acres. So it's so it's 15.7 plus this. Is that right? And how and how much should

You know, I don't have that in my notes right now, but I'll I'll get that. And Okay. But it it's it virtually functions as a the only access point to the existing golf course and the park. It's just under park's jurisdiction at this time.

I see. So it's right. So it's serving as a road. Yeah.

It serves as as a So it's not

a loss of parkland. It changed from a park road to a city street is your point. Is that right?

Okay. Basically, what my point is also this we did a study of that area a few years back and recommended making that map city street. Okay.

We'll be separate from this application. Yeah.

It would nothing to with this application.

Okay. And then last question on the nonexclusive waterfront access easement. So the piece of the access road here that we're talking about a disposition of city owned property for the purpose of an easement is already it's a publicly accessible roadway. Correct? Yes.

So the applicant here could take could make use of that roadway if this were to be a casino or not or the point is this is publicly accessible. Right. And that's the road in photo number two there. So what what necessitates the need for the easement on top of the existing public access for that road?

So it's so they can always have access to their casino, hotel, and all the related uses to their development. They don't wanna be in a situation where something happens where they can't get access to their garage, their facilities. So they just wanna ensure that it's they can have an easement there.

Okay. And we need a disposition of city owned property for the purpose of that easement. It's not a full disposition of the street. It's a disposition for the purpose of an easement.

That's right. It's nonexclusive. Okay. Understood. Okay. Other questions?

Okay. Seeing none. Thank you, Stephen. We appreciate seeing you again and we'll

look

forward to our follow ups.

I feel like I've worn you down with gaming.

Yes. No questions for me.

This is the last one. Thank you. Sorry, you didn't wear down Gail. Commissioner Benjamin.

Yes. Thanks a lot. I have a couple of questions as usual. I'll be very, very quick. One, as I asked in the others, how far has the state legislation been introduced yet?

So they're in a similar situation as the other entity that's trying to get the alienation legislation. So they haven't as far as we know, they haven't advanced yet. But I can get an update from them as to exactly how far along they are. They had some draft language last year. So, they're still working on something that we have drafts of things.

Yeah. And now in changing this concession agreement with Valleys, will that be a major concession in terms of the charter major and the city planning definition of major concession?

So if they change the concession for how long their lease is on the golf course. Is that what

you're referring Yes.

And if they change the nature of the activities that are allowed there because of what we're allowing in the CA.

Hypothetically, if they got the license and this was approved, these actions were approved, they can build and operate, and it's approved by the CACs, and everything's approved, they can operate the casino there. But the license for the golf course would likely be renegotiated for an extended period because they would want to be able much like the easement, they would want to have once they put that amount of effort and money into building the development, they would want to maintain control over the golf course.

To allow these new activities that weren't allowed because it was a park. So if you could look into the question of whether those changes would constitute a major concession or an alteration to a major concession that would have to go through its own

Yeah, I think it likely would.

So if the alienation legislation goes through and and the license is awarded, the site that is where the casino was going to be that is alienated will be transferred over to Bally's, and they will attain title. The golf course, it will be essentially removed from the golf course agreement, which, they have now with Bally's parks and Bally's are talking about what form and how that would precisely be accomplished. Okay. So it's depending on

what materials that it would

be a concession. Well, it may or may not. There's other possibilities. And so there are, you know, I think at this point, there's ongoing discussions between not involving us, but between parks and valleys about sort of how that would function. And so there's a couple of options that they're talking about. Whether it comes back to us or not depends on what they

And what are the options that they're I assume they're discussing doing it as part of

the demapping agreement? There's demapping, there's legislation, there's lease, there's it's a I think it's a concession at this point.

It is a concession. Or franchise. It's a concession.

Okay. So and we're not participating in those conversations, sort of the how that will play out, the term, the conditions.

But wouldn't all that have to be done before the CAC could consider it? No. Because

what the CAC is considering is I mean, there it won't have to be accomplished because it's the non gaming facility aspects of the golf course, not the gaming facility.

Well, except whatever the agreement is going to be and whatever form that those discussions take for the property that will constitute the gaming facility, wouldn't those discussions have to be finished?

No. Because the property that constitutes the gaming facilities will, in any event, not be part of those discussions Because that will be conveyed everything else happening, that would be conveyed to Bally's directly and the golf course and any conversations between Valleys and the Parks Department about the golf course, what the form will be, what the term will be, will exclude the gaming facility. And right now there's about, I think, precisely, there's more than a decade left on the existing agreement. So there's some time.

Right. But removing the gaming facility from the current concession, wouldn't that require the FCRC approval?

No, because it's part of the legislation that authorizes it, the state legislation, and therefore that does not need to be resolved before the CAC process. But does it have to go to the FCRC? So it depends on what the form is that Parks and Valleys ultimately reaches or what agreements they how they decide to proceed on the golf course. And again, I don't know that that's decided or not decided at this point. I do know that we're not really participating in those discussions because it's about that.

So whether it goes to the FCRC or not, I think we need to understand what parks and valleys are talking about. And I don't think those discussions are like at a point where there's an answer to that question. Okay. Well, if you

would let valleys know that the answer to that question is of serious interest to

I'll hold it. Yes. Not for now though, but we'll give you a chance in this process. But hold it for now. Yes. Okay.

All

right. I may also ahead.

Steven Leonard from Technical Review. You had mentioned that the golf course would be affected by the the CA four that's mapped. But if anything that remains in the park outside of the demapping area won't have any different status under zoning or under parks regulations. It's still gonna be map parkland. So the golf course will be unaffected by these land use. I mean, other than the the development of the of the casino and and but the the in terms of a rep from regulatory perspective

And some

of the

parking that's gonna be moved.

Right. Physically there will be changes, but regulatorily it will be under the same rules as it

is today.

As I said, so I'd like to understand the current arrangement in the concession that Bally's got from the Trump people, and that the Parks Department had approved and how that arrangement is altered by the arrangements we might be approving here.

Understood. Okay. Got it.

Thank you.

Thanks Commissioner. Okay. This item is certified. Thank you very much. Thanks, Stephen. Okay. Sarah, let's talk about what's next.

The third item on our agenda is a certification of a zoning map and zoning tax amendments in Brooklyn Community District 2. Our presenter is Amrita Mahesh.

Hello.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

Good afternoon.

This is a private application to facilitate an 816,000 square foot mixed use development with six eleven apartments, of which approximately 150 to 180 apartments would be affordable pursuant to the MIH program and 280,000 square feet of non residential space, including commercial, retail and self storage uses. The project area is located in the Wallabot neighborhood of Community District 2 in Brooklyn. The applicant is seeking a zoning map amendment from an m one two district to m one six a and m one six a r 8 and m one five districts and a zoning text amendment to establish a special mixed use district and a mandatory inclusionary housing area. The Wallabaugh neighborhood is located between Flushing Avenue and Park Avenue and was split off from the Fort Greene and Clinton Hill neighborhoods after the construction of the elevated Brooklyn Queens Expressway in the 1960s. It is located immediately to the south of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Industrial Campus, which occupies 300 acres along the Brooklyn Waterfront and is home to 400 plus diverse businesses, primarily operating in the industrial and creative sectors.

The project area is a full block site bounded by Flushing Avenue and Park Avenue between Hall Street and Ryerson Street. At the eastern edge of the neighborhood near the project area, the built context consists of six to 10 story loft and warehouse buildings, residential conversions and one to two storey commercial and industrial buildings. Residences, community facilities and a mix of other users, including retail users are scattered throughout in buildings ranging between two and seven storeys. The South Williamsburg neighborhood further to the East and Northeast is predominantly residential and mixed use in character. The mixed income Navy Green development sits at the center of the neighborhood and includes nearly 500 homes in three to 12 storey buildings with grounds low commercial and community facility space.

New York City Housing Authority's NYCHA, Ingersoll, Whitman and Whitman houses to the Southwest include residential towers amidst open space and recreational areas. At the western edge of the neighborhood are two to four story row homes and a 13 story tower in the park residential development, as well as the nearly 11 acre Commodore Barry Park built in 1836, the oldest park in Brooklyn. The Susan McKinney School is located along North Oxford Street and the Walt Whitman branch of the Brooklyn Public Library, PS sixty seven, and the Gotham Health Cumberland outpatient facility are located on a superblock between North Portland And Saint Edward Streets along Park Avenue. The project area has access to multiple sorry. One moment.

As noted earlier, the surrounding area features a robust mix of users in a range of building typologies. Mixed use buildings and walk up residential buildings are common. Industrial users are interspersed throughout and are largely and largely consists of self storage users and some warehouse and distribution users. Auto users also exist but are concentrated in certain areas such as by Steuben Park and along parts of Clinton Avenue and Park Avenue. The area below the six lane BQE along Park Avenue is primarily used as open storage and private vehicle parking.

The majority of the Wallabot neighborhood is mapped with an M12 light industrial district. M12 districts allow for a variety of enclosed manufacturing, industrial and commercial uses up to an FAR of two and some community facility uses up to 4.8 FAR. M12 also allows for a structure to rise 60 feet or before setting back within a sky exposure plane. And one two districts impose parking and loading requirements that vary by requirement category. Areas to the West and South are mapped with a medium density r six district, and Block 2033 between Vanderbilt And Claremont Avenues is mapped with R7 D and R8 medium density residential districts with a C24 commercial overlay.

C24 districts allow a range of local serving commercial and retail and service users. Brooklyn Navy Yard is mapped with a range of light, medium and heavy industrial districts, including M12, M14, M21 and M31 districts and is subject to additional regulations concerning used bulk streetscape, open space, parking and loading and other waterfront regulations established by the special Brooklyn Navy Yard District adopted in 2021. Recent land use actions in the area include the HPD led Navy Green rezoning mentioned earlier, which was adopted in 2009 and facilitated the redevelopment of a former city owned site with mixed income housing, retail and community facility uses. In 2018, the 205 Park Avenue rezoning was adopted to include the Park Avenue frontage of the same block and has been developed with a nine story 70 unit apartment building. Additionally, residential conversions of existing structures have also occurred, including examples such as the 275 Park Avenue development pursuant to the last law.

The special Brooklyn Navy Yard District was adopted in 2021 to facilitate the implementation of the Yards Master Plan, which envisions new development to accommodate an increase in employment to 30,000 employees by 2030 and to enhance industrial operations, while further integrating the Navy Yard with the surrounding community. The special district facilitates these goals of creating nearly 4,600,000 square feet of development and four acres of public open space concentrated in three areas along the perimeter of the campus, allowing the Navy Yard to achieve a total of 11,000,000 square feet of space at full build out. The project area has access to multiple transit options, including the subway, buses and ferry. The closest subway station is located four blocks out of the project area at Clinton And Washington Avenue, servicing the G Subway line, a roughly fifteen minute walk. The area services multiple buses, including the B57, B69 and B62 bus routes, which connects Wallabard to Downtown Brooklyn and Queens, Grand Army Plaza in Long Island City and Greenpoint Williamsburg, respectively.

The B-sixty7 passing through the Navy Yard connects riders to the York Street Station, Dumbo, Downtown Brooklyn and Windsor Terrace. The New York City East River Ferry has stopped near the Navy Yard at Dock 72 and to the Northeast at Schaeffer Landing in South Williamsburg with access to Lower Manhattan, Western Queens and the Upper East Side. The Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway is a 26 mile pedestrian and cyclist route connecting the Varroa's Waterfront neighborhoods from Greenpoint to Howard Beach. The pathway runs directly adjacent to the project area along Flushing Avenue and is a completely separated two way bicycle path along this portion of the route. And the BQE Interstate 278 is an arterial highway elevated approximately 30 feet above grade with a width of 160 feet along this stretch of Wollabot.

The BQE runs one block south of the Navy Yard with approximate access ramps and is the only highway that allows freight trucks in Brooklyn, providing important freight access for the borrowing region. The project area is not located within the FEMA designated 1% or 0.2% annual chance floodplain. However, it is located within the 2080s projected future floodplain. The majority of the Navy Yard and portions of the surrounding area are located in the 1% annual chance floodplain. The project area is located within the state and national register of historic places that listed one of our industrial historic district, an approximately 4.5 block area established in 2012.

Nine buildings in the project area are contributing resources. This is an aerial image facing east. The development site is improved with 10 existing former manufacturing buildings, buildings A through J, that were constructed between the late 1880s and the 1920s. They range in height from one to nine stories. In total, the existing buildings contain approximately 532,000 square feet of zoning floor area or 4.68 FAR and are overbuilt.

The development site was licensed by the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation, but temporarily operating a humanitarian emergency response and relief center or HERC. The HERC facility is slated to close by summer twenty twenty five. All of the buildings on the development site are in use by the Herc, except for portions of Building I along Hall Street. Approximately 3,000 square feet of commercial space is currently in use, and 11,000 square feet of front floor retail space is currently vacant.

Unknown caller.

Here are some street views of the project area. This is a view along Park Avenue and Hall Street looking east towards Buildings E And D in the foreground. This is a view along Park Avenue looking west. This portion of Park Avenue has two travel lanes and a parking lane along the project site frontage. This is a view of the mid block conditions along Hall Street looking south with some of the smaller loft structures in the project area to the left of the image.

And this is a view of Flushing Avenue looking east at existing buildings A And J. And this is another view of Flushing Avenue looking west. Flushing Avenue is a local truck route. The protected bike lane part of the Brooklyn Greenway is also seen here. And this is a view of the mid block conditions along Ryerson Street looking south.

The proposed development would include conversions and adaptive reuse of eight existing buildings and demolition of two structures, buildings A And J along Flushing Avenue, to allow for an infill new development. The new mixed use building would be located along the short end of the block on Flushing Avenue and would contain approximately 393,000 square feet of floor area with approximately 381,000 square feet of residential users and 12,000 square feet of retail users. It would provide four sixty four new units, including approximately 116 to 139 permanently affordable housing units in accordance with NIH requirements. Building B, a nine storey structure along Ryerson Street, would be converted to a residential building containing approximately 154,000 square feet of floor area. It would include approximately 147 units, 37 to 44 of which would be pursuant to MIH.

The first two floors of Building B would be occupied by the proposed accessory parking facility with a capacity of approximately 60 spaces. Existing Buildings C And D located at the corner of Ryerson Street and Park Avenue and Hall Street are nine storey buildings that would be renovated to accommodate 156,000 square foot self storage facility. The existing one story Building E would be renovated to provide 2,900 square feet of retail space. And Buildings F, G, H And I, four buildings at the mid block of the development site with Frontage on Hall Street totaling approximately 108,000 square feet, would be renovated to provide retail on the Ground Floor and office maker studio spaces on the upper levels. These spaces would include white box spaces, pre built spaces and maker studios that would cater to smaller commercial tenants.

Retail uses are envisioned on the Ground Floors of the nonresidential buildings along Hall Street and along Flushing Avenue. Flushing Avenue would also include the entrance to the residential lobby for Building A. The proposed accessory parking facility would be accessed via an existing curb cut on Ryerson Street. An enclosed loading berth would also be provided with access along Ryerson Street and loading Building A would also include a loading berth as well with access along Ryerson Street. And self storage users would occupy the Ground Floor portions along Park Avenue.

The courtyard would be landscaped for use by residents and visitors. This is a rendered elevation of the proposed development as seen from the Hall Street frontage. And this is a pedestrian perspective of the proposed development, also along the Hall Street frontage illustrating the envisioned mix of adaptive reuse and new construction strategies. The applicant is proposing to rezone the project area from an M 12 District to an M 16 R8 District and M15 Districts. The M16A R8 District is a mixed use district that would permit a maximum residential FAR of 7.2 with MIH, community facility FAR of 6.5 for zoning lots with mixed use buildings and a commercial and manufacturing FAR of eight.

The applicable height and setback regulations for mixed buildings in the M16A RA Districts are the heightened setback regulations applicable in the M16A District, which would permit a maximum base height of 155 feet and a maximum building height of two forty five feet and up to approximately three zero six feet for zoning lots greater than 20,000 square feet. The mid block portion of the project area along Hall Street would be mapped within M 15 District. The proposed M 15 District permits a maximum SAR of five for commercial and manufacturing users and 6.5 for community facility users. M 15 allows for a structure to right rise 85 feet or six stories before setting back within a sky exposure plane. The project area is located in the inner transit zone within the Greater Transit Zone.

No parking is required for residential users as well as for the proposed nonresidential uses in the M16 District with an A suffix within the greater Transit Zone. Additionally, no parking is required for portions of the project area proposed to be mapped within M15 District. Requirements for loading and specified dimensions for types of berths differ according to square footage and type of use. The applicant is seeking to create a new special mixed use MX27 District in Wallabot. The applicant is proposing to establish a mandatory inclusionary housing area with options one and two within the project area.

Option one requires 25% of the residential floor area to be set aside at incomes averaging 60% AMI with a minimum of 10% to be affordable at 40% AMI. And option two requires 30% of residential floor area to be set aside at incomes averaging 80% AMI. Pursuant to local law 78 of 2021, this application requires a racial equity report because it would increase the permitted nonresidential floor area by at least 200,000 square feet and residential floor area by at least 50,000 square feet. The project area is located in the Brooklyn Navy Yard neighborhood tabulation area NTA, which is a nonresidential NTA, which did not meet the minimum criteria to calculate displacement risk. However, the displacement risk scores for the bordering NTAs at Fort Green is intermediate, Clinton Hill is lower and Williamsburg is higher.

The proposed development is anticipated to include approximately six eleven units with 184 affordable at an average of 80% AMI. The income of households occupying the proposed affordable units is estimated within to be within the range of $65,000 to $196,000 And monthly rent would be approximately between $1,600 and $4,900 The project area is located in the Brooklyn Heights and Fort Green Public Use Microdata area in 2020. Brooklyn Heights and Fort Green and in Brooklyn Heights and Fort Green, 12% of the population identified as Asian non Hispanic, 20% as black non Hispanic, 14% as Hispanic Latino and 47% as white non Hispanic. From 2010 to 2020, in the Brooklyn Heights and Fort Green area, Asian non Hispanic population increased by 109%, black population decreased by 12%, Hispanic Latino population increased by 11%, and the white non Hispanic population increased by 40%. From 2010 to 2023, housing units in the Brooklyn Heights and Fort Green area increased by 38%.

And from 2010 to 2020, population increased by 29%. In summary, the applicant is seeking a zoning map and text amendments to facilitate an 816,000 square foot mixed use development with six eleven units, including approximately 150 to 180 MIH units. Thank you. That concludes my presentation.

Great. Thank you very much.

Let me start with Commissioner Benjamin.

Okay. Currently, what is the site being used for? It's currently being used as a HERC, a Humanitarian Emergency response relief center licensed by the city.

And it is the largest of the housing facilities, particularly now that Floyd Bennett Field is closed. Is that not true? That's correct. And where are those people scheduled to go? Because they just increased it. With the closing of Floyd Bennett, there are now more undocumented persons in this facility than ever before, which is now the largest in

the borough? Sure. We are in touch with the Office of Asylum Seeker Operations. We can certainly follow-up with them and get you a more specific response. Our understanding is that this facility is slated to close by summer twenty twenty five, and there is a transition plan, that the city is working on.

Unfortunately, for many, the transition plan is that after sixty days, they have to leave. So if we just calculate sixty days from now, anybody who's there can't be there anymore. And this has been a very significant concern to the community, that for many of the people who leave this shelter, they've taken over the park that is across the BQE. And there is a small open space on Flushing, that is occupied twenty four seven by persons from the shelter, particularly those who are Grubhub drivers or Uber drivers, and their bicycles and scooters are all over. So I think we need to know what's gonna happen.

The owners of these sites have made a fortune from the city for allowing their facilities to be used for housing of undocumented persons. And there have been lots of So rewarding them by allowing just this one block to enjoy the new zoning. Why didn't if we think this is the right zoning for the neighborhood, why didn't we expand it to the adjacent blocks that are between the BQE and Flushing and that are also zoned M1 districts.

Thank you, Commissioner, for the comment. I think regarding the previous comment, we're happy to try to get you more specific responses from OASO. Regarding the second comment, this is a private application being sought by the development team and their proposed project area is the one block. And this geography or this type of scale is generally consistent with incremental rezoning, but we can certainly take your question to heart and follow-up with consideration.

Because many times, the department encourages a private applicant to expand the area so that it makes sense from a zoning perspective when the adjoining blocks all exhibit the same characteristics. Sure. So I'm curious why we didn't do that here.

Absolutely. Thank you. We can follow-up

Also with in the Puma, are Ingersoll, Whitman, and Lafayette Gardens in the same PUMA? They In

the PUMAs that were considered? That's right. So this is the extent of the PUMA, and it does include the three public housing communities.

The black outline. Right. Then there were

two things. One, I'm surprised that the white population has gone up so significantly given the population that is in Ingersoll, Whitman, and Lafayette Gardens. And two, I'm wondering I know the applicant chose option one or two and is not choosing the workforce, but I would think that the workforce would make more sense here when it's across the street from the Navy Yard, which has a large population of blue collar workers to include housing for the people who work there.

Thank you for the comments, Commissioner. Regarding the first question, we're happy to take a more closer look at the NTA level information if we can and follow-up with you. And regarding the workforce option, we will relay that comment to the applicant for their consideration. Okay. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Sarriao?

Thank you, Chair. Thank you so much for the presentation. I had just a couple of very few very specific questions. One is, I just want to make sure I'm correct in that. Even though this is an MX proposal, none of the proposed plans include industrial. Right? These are mixed commercial, retail, residential, parking and self storage. Right?

That's right. But buildings, F to I, are envisioned to have more creative uses, the smaller loft buildings. It can potentially include light industrial, which is a permitted use under the proposed zoning. But at this time, it's envisioned as commercial maker spaces.

Yes. I guess my question is I mean, spirit of the question is that I'm concerned with M2R changes here. I know that we had discussed earlier a couple of months ago perhaps when we were discussing environmental economic opportunities, you did yes for economic opportunity, whether it could be possible to understand what are the larger trends neighborhood wide in terms of industrial retention and so forth, given what Commissioner Benjamin mentioned in terms of the proximity to the Navy Yard, but also the Flushing Corridor, the fact that the surrounding blocks are still industrial, it would be great if you can provide some numbers in terms of what is that mix. I know that you got us or that the results of the EAS were negative. I just want to understand what the potential displacement of other businesses could look like here.

My understanding is that there is because of what you said also to just clarify, there are no other than the uses the temporary uses here for emergency relief, there isn't any anything else, right?

That's right. This is, I believe, a 3,000 square foot commercial space. But other than that, it's primarily used by the hurricane was previously vacant. The applicant has noted some tenanting challenges. But regarding a general sort of development trends in market land use trends in the area, the areas that are currently M are mostly warehouse users, distribution users and self storage. There's a lot of self storage. And there are some smaller businesses as well, and we're happy to find some information for you about that.

Yes. Thank you. I appreciate that. And then the other thing is in looking at the residential mix, I didn't see much information on the unit size. And I was wondering if you can expand on that, but also at the same sense in terms of the affordability levels, this to me calls for deeper affordability and an intentional sort of like approach to connect residential here with where the jobs are or could be? Again, the comment that I made earlier in terms of connecting this intentionally with what is the larger land use policy for industrial retention would be very helpful.

Absolutely. Thank you, Commissioner. On the topic of industrial retention, I think the department is kind of keeping in mind the proximity to the Brooklyn Navy Yard as well, where there is a concerted effort to expand the yard and provide subsidized space for industrial growth and retention. And thinking about the larger geography in the context of the planned growth of nearly 4,600,000 spaces. But we can certainly follow-up with you with a more concrete response about the larger area, and we will have the applicant elaborate on the unit mix as well. At this time, they have indicated that it's anticipated to be studios, one bedrooms, two bedrooms and three bedrooms, and that during the outreach process, the community has requested more of family size units, one bedroom, two bedroom and three bedroom.

Thank you. I would appreciate that.

Thank you.

Thank you. Commissioner, Commissioner Kramani.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you for the presentation. And just want to align my questions with Commissioner Benjamin's and Commissioner Osorio's on the affordability and the Puma. I know that in and offer this. I know that in this particular neighborhood, I'm very familiar with it, that public housing and the income there, it's almost like I think when we look deeper into the PUMA, it's like a barbell diagram, where there is very low income on one end, very high income on the other, and it actually brings the average income up.

And we've talked about this among us in session before, that it really does shape how we are defining affordability. And I think we need to have a deeper conversation about it. So that's not necessarily a question, and I apologize. But just something that I feel very strongly about. It's not real. The affordability is not real.

Thank you for the comment, Commissioner. And we can certainly relay this to the applicant and have them elaborate on their exact mix and affordability considerations. Thank

you, Commissioner.

Commissioner Mann?

Sorry to keep us going here, but one last question for me. Has the Brooklyn office or department thought about just a planning framework for the Wabad area? Because it feels like it's crying out for BQB on one side, South Williamsburg on the other. And just developing a strategy for the area rather than having these sites one by one get rezoned.

Absolutely. I think it's definitely an area, as you pointed out, has the characteristics that needs further look. I'll defer to Alex on some specifics.

Sure. And so thank you for the question and completely agree. We've been attempting to kick start a study for this area from it includes the walled out portion above the BQE East towards Broadway Triangle and the M areas in that area. It's focused on a community development block grant focused on resiliency and and flooding, particularly stormwater. But as part of that, we wanna understand land uses, transportation networks, and so on.

So I've actually come up here. I think I've said it before, but we had some issues as it related to bringing on a consultant as it related to some of our procurement processes that change at the state and federal level. So we had to go redo our procurement. That's why there's sorry for getting into the weeds, but there's been delays on that end. Our our goal is to start in the next few months once we get our consultant on board. So we are thinking about this area. Definitely agree with you on that. And I think that there can be a balance here of different

uses as long as we

take into consideration all the resiliency, the affordability concerns and transportation network.

And just one follow-up there. I think this may be to the applicant, not so much to the department, but it would be great to get the Navy Yards' perspective on these applications. And so I don't know if they've had a chance to really review this and understand how it dovetails with their long term

planning. Absolutely.

I believe they have done some preliminary outreach, but we can certainly have the applicant elaborate on their conversations with the yard.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, commissioner.

Any other questions?

Okay. Thank you. This item is certified. Thank you very much. Okay. Let's move on to the next item, some post referrals.

The fourth item on our agenda is a non EULAR post referral review of a zoning authorization in the Bronx Community District 9. Our presenter

is Cesar Del Cabo. Good

afternoon, commissioners.

Good afternoon.

This is a post referral presentation of the 1460 And 1480 Sheridan Boulevard Waterfront application. Next slide. Next slide. Thank you. Simon Companies requested zoning authorization to modify visual corridor required locations to facilitate the development of a waterfront public access area on 1460 And 1480 Sheridan Boulevard in the East Crotona Park neighborhood, Community District 9 at the Bronx.

Next slide. The proposed development is in two sites, 1460 Sheridan Boulevard to the North and 1480 Sheridan Boulevard to the South, which are along the recently transformed Sheridan Boulevard and directly adjacent to the also recently renovated Starlight Park. The proposed development consists of approximately 45,000 square feet of public access areas that would contain walking paths, native vegetation lighting, different types of sitting and tables, sound loungers, bicycle racks, fixtures for sensory experiences for kids and a fitness equipment area for the public's use. The proposed development is a planned follow-up to a previously approved EULRP application approved in 2023. Back then, the applicant requested a rezoning and the designation of a mandatory inclusionary housing area.

Those actions were to facilitate three new 24 storey mixed residential and commercial buildings with approximately 800,000 square feet floor area, including nine seventy units, 21,000 square feet of commercial space and 100 parking spaces. Next slide. Development Site 11460 Sheridan Boulevard will be developed with approximately 25,000 square feet of water and public access areas and upland connections. It will have a direct connection to Starlight Park, adjacency to retail space with opportunity to spill out with sitting on tables and an area with exercise equipment, river lookout platforms, and playful sensorial fixtures distributed throughout the site. The application for rezoning and MIH approved in 2023 proposed one twenty four storey building containing approximately 300 units and 5,000 square feet of commercial uses and residential amenities.

Next slide.

Development Site 21480 Sheridan Boulevard will be developed with 20,000 square feet of Waterfront Public Access Area and Upland Connections. The Waterfront Public Access Area will let us space for future connection to Waterfront public access areas in the sites to the north and open up amphitheater, a plaza, river lookout platforms, and playful sensorial fixtures throughout the site. The application for rezoning and MIH approved in 2023 proposed two buildings containing 600 dwelling units, commercial uses, residential amenities and 100 parking spaces.

Next slide.

In order to facilitate this waterfront public access areas, the applicant is requesting a zoning authorization pursuant to zoning resolution section 62,822 to modify visual corridors established as required per section 62,511 of the zoning resolution. The proposed development site 21480 Sheridan Boulevard that you see on the screen requires two visual corridors. Adjustments to the visual corridor requirements are being pursued in order to address the unique size and location of the lot in relation to the waterfront and be able to optimize the space to provide the pursuit amount of housing. As described in the graphic on the screen, the proposed visual corridor one, while it is 70 feet wide and complies with requirements, it does not align with the prolongation of Jennings Street. The proposed visual corridor intersects the shoreline at a 28 degree angle rather than the 45 degrees that is required to.

The proposed modifications to the required visual corridors will provide equivalent public space and enjoyment of the waterfront and views to the water from the upland streets. Next slide. The General Board of the Bronx Community Board nine held a meeting on 12/19/2024 to review this project. The board decided to issue a letter of support with conditions on the proposal. The conditions in the letter read as follows: parking garage updates regarding costs and maintenance to be shared with CB9 as they become available and best effort commitment to maintain parking management in house to allow for low and reasonable parking fees new renderings to be shared with CB9 as they become available, providing healthy food options for the storefront of retail spaces, publicly accessible bike racks and bike repair stations, ensure that the Bronx River Alliance would be invited to regular meetings with the developer and general contractors to provide progress updates, ensure that the construction does not pollute or damage the river or interrupt the Bronx River Alliance operations.

And those were the recommendations. Next slide. That concludes my presentation. Thank you very much for your attention. I will be happy to answer any questions.

Okay. Thank you very much. Just one question for me. So the there's a difference between the view corridor between what was otherwise required and what is proposed. Can you just talk a little bit about what the impact would be, what the consequence, if any, would be to somebody who is walking by or trying to experience that view card? Just if you could talk about that for just another minute.

Yes. It is important to say that it is common for these type of situations when we have sites that are on regular or or not very large in width, and the applicant is is providing the minimum widths, and it will it's providing the widths that are required and just tweaking a little bit the orientation and won't really impact other than views from the upland streets, but it's not very significant compared to the fact that they are providing very high quality open space, and they work together with us and parks to provide a very program programmatically public access area with different seating spaces and different good characteristics for the community.

Thank you. Commissioner Manin?

Sure. I just

I just wanted to piggyback on that because I do respect and I appreciate the response that you provided, Sasan. But the purpose of the ViewCarter was not for more green amenities and more park space. It was for the upland connectors to be able to see what's going on. So I question I understand the efforts is laudable and I do appreciate it. But I don't think that we're getting from this view corridor what was intended. And I just need to put that statement out there.

Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you. Anybody else on this one? Okay. We'll schedule this one for about two weeks. Thank you very much.

Thank you. As always.

The fifth item on our agenda is a non EULIP post referral review for an authorization in Manhattan Community District 7. Our presenter is Ben Huff.

Alright, Ben. Welcome.

Good afternoon, commissioners. So this is a private application for parking within the Manhattan Core. Oh, presentation's not up yet. K. This application is on behalf of seven two o WEA Ventures LLC and Glacial Equities pursuant to Section 13,442 of the zoning resolution for an authorization to allow an off street parking facility with a maximum capacity of 15 spaces.

The proposed parking facility would be located within an existing 15 story building located at 720 West End Avenue in the Upper West Side area of Manhattan Community District 7. The building, which was built without parking spaces, is located within an R10A zoning district within the Riverside West Historic District Extension 2. As noted, the project site is within the Manhattan core and is undergoing a renovation and expansion that will contain 131 residential condo units when completed. The proposed parking facility is intended to serve as an added amenity for the residents of the building and would provide a safe and convenient place for parking. So 720 West End Avenue is located on the southwest portion of Block 1243 at the intersection of West 95th Street, a 60 foot narrow street, and West End Avenue, a 100 foot wide street.

The site is approximately 20,150 square feet in lot area. There is an existing 15 foot wide curb cut at the site accessed along West 95th Street. The proposed development site is improved with the 15 storey residential building that has an FAR of 4.2. The subject block, Block 1243, includes multifamily residential buildings and ground floor commercial and retail uses along West 95th Street and Broadway. The existing land uses within the surrounding area consist of multifamily residences, mixed use commercial and residential buildings, commercial and office buildings and community facilities, including houses of worship.

Located generally to the Northwest and Southwest of the development site are R10A and R8 zoning districts that mostly contain multifamily residential elevator buildings. Located to the Northeast and Southeast of the development site are C46A, C28, R10A, R9A, R8, R9, EC3 and EC2 zoning districts, which contain a mixed use commercial and residential and commercial and office buildings. Most of the Ground Floor commercial contains local retail. The Peter J. Sharp Theater And Symphony Space is located just south of the proposed development site on Block 1242.

One block west of the development site is Riverside Park located along the Hudson River. The park includes a variety of passive and active spaces, including sports courts and fields, a skate park, the Manhattan Waterfront greenway path for pedestrian and bicyclists, a public marina, and New York State trails. The proposed development site is well served by public transportation. The MTA 96th Street subway stop serving the one, two, and three lines is located along Broadway directly across from the subject block. The MTA M96 and M106 bus lines run east west along West 96th Street with a stop located north of the proposed development site at the corner of West End Avenue.

The M96 provides crosstown service from West End Avenue to 1st Avenue and the M106 provides crosstown service from West End Avenue to the FDR Drive. The MTA M104 bus line runs north south along Broadway with a stop located south of the proposed development site at West 94th Street and provides service from West Harlem to Times Square. The MTA M7 and M11 bus lines run north south along Amsterdam Avenue. The M7 provides service from Harlem to 14th Street, and the M11 provides service from the Riverbank Park Harlem to the West Village. The existing building was developed in 1927 as an apartment hotel without parking.

Adjacent to the building was an empty lot. Seven accessory parking spaces were added in conjunction with the temporary certificate of occupancy in 1968 and repeated in the permanent certificate of occupancies issued in 1971 and again in 1975, which is the most recently issued certificate of occupancy. This lot used for accessory parking had a 15 foot curb cut. As part of the redevelopment, it will now contain an extension in the main building. That's that sort of white building to the right of the large brick one.

In 1984, the proposed development site and general surrounding area were subject to the West Side Highway density Columbus And Amsterdam Avenue zoning map amendment and zoning text amendment actions, which rezone the area from West 59th Street and West 86th Street, Central Park West and the Hudson River to ensure that new construction would be compatible with the existing built context while not unduly restricting development potential. The action rezoned the proposed development site from an R-ten zoning district to the current R-10A zoning district. In 2012, the east side of the subject block and general surrounding area were subject to the Upper West Side Special Enhanced Commercial District zoning map amendment and zoning text amendment actions, which established and mapped the special Upper West Side Enhanced Commercial District or EC2 along 77 blocks of Amsterdam And Columbus Avenues and the special Upper West Side Enhanced Commercial District three along 73 blocks of Broadway within Manhattan Community Board seven. The general goals of these enhanced districts include, among others, the promotion and maintenance of a lively and engaging pedestrian experience along commercial avenues. In 2017, the building was sold by the Salvation Army to a developer who sold to the current applicant.

In 2018, the applicant received Landmark's approval for the redevelopment. The applicant filed a ZRD one with the Department of Buildings establishing the existing seven accessory parking spaces, which was approved by the Department of Buildings in December 2022. On this slide are some photos of the site as it stands today. The photo on the left is of the project site looking from West End Avenue between West 95th and West 96th Street. As you can see, the site is currently covered in scaffolding as it's undergoing its renovation.

On the right is the site looking north from West 95th Street. Before I discuss how the parking before I discuss the parking facility operations, I just want to show rendering cross section of the redeveloped building. As I discussed, the building is undergoing a renovation into a 131 residential condos. The requested authorization is for the inclusion of a total of 15 off street parking spaces in the existing building 720 West End Avenue on the left. The redevelopment includes an extension over the previous parking lot, which again is the white building in the center.

The self parking garage the self parking garage will have a car lift that will be accessed by a 12 foot wide curb cut. The applicant is reducing the existing 15 foot curb cut along West 95th Street. The parking facility will be located partially at grade, but mostly underground and will not add floor area to the site. To enter the parking garage, driver will travel eastbound on West 95th Street and take a left into the street level space, which equates to the 2nd Floor of the existing building due to the elevation change. Cars will enter the car lift and go down to the cellar level, the Ground Floor level, to access the parking garage.

The driver uses a clicker or RFID identification tag on their vehicle to activate the elevator. Once on the elevator, the driver remains in the their vehicle, and the automatic sequence takes them down to the parking level. So this site plan shows that parking level. The licensees of the parking spaces will exit the lift and drive their vehicle to their assigned parking spot. To leave the facility, drivers will approach the elevator and use their clicker or RFID sensor to activate the elevator automated sequence.

Likewise, an indicator light on the door will let any cars trying to exit if the elevator is occupied with a car coming down to the parking level, in which case they will need to wait for said automobile to vacate the lift before the exiting car can enter the lift. When the when the lift while in the lift, the exiting car reaches street grade, the garage door opens, and the car exits with a left hand turn to travel east on West 95th Street. For folks who have parking spaces to access their vehicles in the garage, residents will enter the garage from a door in the lobby with a key fob. So I've circled that in red on the left that shows on the right, white, the parking spaces. On left, the lobby level of the building.

The application was referred out for public review on 11/15/2024 for forty five days. Community Board seven elected to not hold a public hearing on the project and submitted a no objection recommendation. I have here the text of 13,442 as shown in the statement of findings and discussion of conditions that accompany this application. The proposed parking facility is intended to serve as an added amenity for the residents of the building and would provide buildings residents with a safe and convenient place to park. I'm zooming in now on the findings.

The commission expects the applicant to meet for the authorization. To summarize, the site should be designed within a manner that does not disrupt pedestrian flow with respect to key facilities such as transit. The proposed facility should not interfere with the street nor be inconsistent with neighborhood character. So to wrap up, the applicant seven twenty WEA Ventures LLC and Glacial Equities is seeking a thirteen four four two authorization for 15 parking spaces in a building that was constructed without parking. The completed redevelopment will contain 131 residential condo units and they are seeking this authorization to have a convenient way for residents to park.

I'm happy to take any questions now. Great.

Thank you very much. Ben, just I think you noted it before, but this block has a curb cut in the space where they're proposing to have the parking garage already. Is that right?

That's correct. It's exactly where the garage door is you see on this rendering. So it was a 15 foot curb cut, and the applicant will be reducing that to a 12 foot curb cut, which is standard for regular parking garages parking facilities.

Okay. Alright. Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much. We will, schedule this one for a vote. Thanks, Ben. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

The sixth item on our agenda is a non EULAR post referral review for a previously approved authorization. In Manhattan Community District 2, our presenter is Ben Heff.

I'm back. Okay. It's been a while.

This is a private application to remove parking within the Manhattan core. Oh, and I didn't wait again for the presentation. Great. So this application is on behalf of one two five Owners LLC pursuant to section eleven four three, renewal of an authorization or special permit of the zoning resolution. This is the second renewal pursuant to eleven forty three of the previously granted 13,443 reduction in the number of required existing parking spaces.

The project site is located at 125 Perry Street, alternatively, 738 Greenwich Street in the West Village of Manhattan Community District 2. I have that, here in red. The building had a layout of 240 parking spaces, of which a 168 were required when the West Village houses were constructed in the nineteen seventies. Those buildings are seen here in blue. The required spaces which were significantly underutilized cannot be formally eliminated without renewal of this authorization.

So the project site is located at the corner of Perry And Greenwich Street. The seven zoning lots, which collectively contain the West Village houses, are spread across tax Blocks 603, 604, 636, 637 and 638. Although the surrounding area was historically a predominantly residential area with commercial and industrial uses located along the East Shore Of The Hudson River, the neighborhood now includes a mix of residential and commercial uses with only a handful of industrial establishments remaining. The area has gained an increasingly residential character as a result of new residential development and conversions of commercial and industrial buildings to residential use. Many of the residents recently introduced in the neighborhood are found within high rise developments between West And Washington Streets.

Commercial uses in the neighborhood consist primarily of local retail establishments concentrated along Hudson Street, Bleecker Street and Christopher Street corridors and the lower portions of West Street. There have been no significant changes in the surrounding area since the authorization was last renewed in 2022. A bit more on the history of the project site. 125 Perry was originally constructed around 1930 and served as a public parking facility that had a layout of two forty parking spaces. In 1970, to enable the construction of the West Village houses, portions of six blocks where the new buildings were to be located were rezoned from an N15 district to a C17 district.

In 1974, construction commenced on the West Village houses, which were created under the New York State Mitchell Lama program, a program that acquired properties through eminent domain and provided them to developers of affordable housing for middle income residents. Under the parking regulations for C1-seven districts at the time, accessory parking was required for 40% of the number of dwelling units created, resulting in the 168 required parking spaces. Due to its close proximity, the 1681 100 60 eight of 125 of sorry. Let me start over. So due to its proximity, one hundred and sixty eight of one two five Perry's two forty spaces served as the required parking spaces, while the other 72 spaces were available to the public.

The garage was also owned by the West Village Housing Development Fund Corporation. The garage was included in the Greenwich Village Historic District when it was created '69 and thus the project site is landmarked. In 1981, the City Planning Commission approved a comprehensive revision to parking requirements which eliminated required accessory residential parking within Manhattan Community Districts 1 Through 8. With certain exceptions, the new text provided that existing buildings continue to be subject to the applicable parking regulations in effect prior to the adoption of the new text. On March 2033, the Commission approved an amendment to the Manhattan core parking regulations, which included the creation of 13,443 authorization to eliminate existing required parking spaces provided such elimination will not cause undue adverse effects on the surrounding area.

In 2017, the West Village houses received authorization via 13,443 to remove the required spaces to sell the building to a developer. The authorization was renewed in 2021. On 05/12/2022, the building was sold to the applicant. The applicant then received Landmarks Preservation Commission approval for the redevelopment of the parking garage into a residential building in 2022 as well. So here we have, some recent photos of the project site.

On the left is a photo of the building looking north on Perry Street. On the right is a photo looking west on Greenwich Street. In both photos, you can see the landmark structure, and this is how it looked as it was used as a parking garage. Very recently, the applicant has covered the building in scaffolding to prepare for conversion. The application was referred out to the public on 11/17/2024 for forty five days.

Community Board two elected to not hold a hearing on the proposed project and submitted a no objection recommendation. So, to review the action, the applicant is seeking an eleven-four-three renewal of authorization for special permit. The original authorization was for a thirteen-four-four-three reduction in the number of required spaces to eliminate required parking spaces of the West Village houses to enable a change in ownership and residential conversion. If an authorization is not vested, it will expire after three years if not renewed. The original authorization was granted in 2017.

It was renewed in 2021 and the building was sold to the applicant in 2022. As the authorization was set to lapse in August 2024, the applicant had submitted their application for renewal prior to that date. The garage ceased to exist as a parking facility in April 2024. The garages certificate of occupancy issued in July 1976 has not yet been updated to remove the reference to the required spaces. The second renewal of the authorization to eliminate the accessory parking requirement will facilitate the alteration and conversion of the garage by the applicant.

Once the conversion is complete, the authorization will vest. So to conclude, the applicant is seeking a renewal of a thirteen four four three authorization for the reduction in the number of required parking spaces. With the renewal, the applicant plans to complete a conversion of this two forty space parking garage to a seven unit residential condo building. This slide includes a rendering of what the new building that was approved by the Landmarks Preservation Commission. That concludes my presentation, and I'm happy to take any questions.

Thank you. I'm going start with Commissioner Benjamin.

Just one quick question. The West Village Apartments for which this was in fulfillment of their minimum required parking, under City of Yes, they no longer need to have that minimum required parking, do they?

If they were to be built today, they would not. Correct. If that's

But if they were required to have it when they were built, then even if they do major alterations, they're still required to have that?

That's a good question. I don't I'm I'm not sure on major renovations. Let me.

Okay. If you just get back to me,

that'd Yeah.

But the question putting aside major renovations, why then are they required to seek a renewal of this special permit unless they are still required to provide some level of parking. What's the dynamic here that requires them to have to come for a renewal of the special permit that eliminate the requirements?

I mean, to take it back, what they did is exactly what this authorization was intended for. So they had required parking. It maintained that it was required for a very long time. We created this authorization. They were not utilizing this parking garage heavily.

At the time that the first authorization happened in 2017, only about 1010% of the parking spaces were being actively used by residents. And so they sought this authorization so that they could remove the required parking and then sell the building to a developer. It sort of taken a while for the applicant who bought the building to, execute on that conversion. I would remind the commission, you know, the COVID nineteen pandemic happened, so that had slowed things down. They're in the process of converting it right now, but the certificate of occupancy still refers to the required spaces.

And so just to be clear, they sought a second renewal to remove it, and then they will proceed

with occupancy for West Village Apartments or the certificate of occupancy for this garage? For this garage. What does the certificate of occupancy for West Village Apartments say?

If it's relation to parking? Yeah. None. All of their required parking was fulfilled off-site in this garage.

Understood. But as part of their required parking, I'm trying to think of how to frame the question. If this was their required parking and you're saying that it's still required if it was required then. Well That we are giving them we're being asked to give them this author this certification or authorization for this garage to not be a garage that fulfills their required parking. Correct?

We are asking for renewal of an authorization we've already granted to remove the parking.

Correct. But if it's an authorization and it would expire, what happens if if the parking requirement is still on West Village Apartments, how will they even if they're not using it, if it was a required parking

This gets them out of it. But don't waste your time. Where's Where's that? And then it's going away.

Let's pose the question. And then we'll get you commissioner next. Do you want to respond to that?

I think thank you for the question. I think I'm understanding what you're asking. The original authorization removed the required parking.

For three years. For three years.

Correct. They were still in the process of selling to the applicant. That authorization, unfortunately, is set that it lapses every three years if it's not vested. It was not vested yet. They sought one renewal.

After that second renewal was approved, they were able to sell to the developer who also got Landmarks Preservation Commission approval for the renovation. A lot of things that just took time plus the COVID nineteen pandemic. And so they're going through with the renovation very shortly. They've just put scaffolding up on the building. And since this renewal was set to lap lapse in August, they filed for a second renewal to just make sure that it's it's clear, that that they that the authorization continues, the required spaces are not required, and that they can follow through on the conversion.